Harry Potter's Vault
by Manchester
Summary: After the events in Deathly Hallows, before he settled down to domesticity, Harry Potter must have had some more adventures and strange experiences. Whether he wanted to or not.
1. Chapter 1

Harry Potter was in the grip of an unique mood for him.

Sitting in an armchair in the front room of Number 12 Grimmauld Place on an extremely dreary day, the young man looked out the window to the square beyond and watched the heavy rain fall outside, all while contemplating the rarely-experienced emotion he was feeling.

Boredom.

It was true that at various points in his life he'd previously felt tired and impatient, usually in Professor Binns' classroom when that teacher's ghost had been droning over something particularly pointless that had occurred during historical times. Still, eventually the classes had ended, and he had gone on with his life at Hogwarts back then that had filled up his days -- being with Ron and Hermione, matching wits with Professor Snape and Draco Malfoy, wondering what the Headmaster was up to, and worrying over Tom Riddle's latest plot to kill his young enemy and Take Over The World.

Harry quietly snorted. It was now almost half a year after the self-designated Dark Lord's final death at the Battle of Hogwarts, and the wizarding world was still celebrating, albeit a bit lower-key than the uproarious delight the populace had shown the first few weeks of hearing about the defeat of their worst fear.

Unfortunately, for the Boy-Who-Lived, this societal composure didn't apply to him. It had been bearable at Hogwarts during his final year, where there had been others who'd acted just as heroically -- Neville, for one -- and the younger students' attention had been diverted mostly away from him in their awe of all of the defenders of the castle against Voldefarts and his Death Nibblers. Almost all of the firsties and higher grades had basically left him alone, except for an occasional timid request for an autograph, of which Harry had resignedly signed, receiving the childrens' stuttering thanks.

This deference didn't apply to the students' parents, and the rest of the adult wizards and witches in Britain.

Harry winced, remembering how he'd been inundated with owl posts the first few weeks after the battle, with the entire Great Hall sometimes nearly filled to the brim with messenger birds interrupting his meals by dropping their mail, letters, and parcels onto him in such numbers that he'd occasionally had to fight his way out of the middle of a growing pile of correspondence.

It might had been different, if he'd particularly cared about anything he'd received. A few thank-you notes and offerings of best wishes would have been bearable and Harry would have conscientiously sent back his own replies, but on the first day several thousands of these messages came, and the same thing happened the next day, and the next, and the next….

Well, the son of James and Lily Potter had finally thrown up his hands and turned to Hermione for advice. The brainy girl had explained to him the Muggle concept of a generic postal reply, and after a few hours of thought and scratched-out attempts by the young man, a cautious answer in a copy of a polite message had gone back with every unopened letter thanking the sender for their interest and gently informing them that the recipient was unable to devote his full attention to their correspondence due to the press of his schoolwork.

There was also in the reply an added note about the bravery of all of those who'd fought against Voldemort, with the young wizard urging that the sacrifice of those who'd not survived should always be remembered, that satisfied Harry's concern that those who had gone on to the undiscovered country wouldn't be forgotten. Hermione had approved, as she had her own people to grieve over. Plus, deep in her mind, the girl was hopeful that this would divert attention away from Harry, and give him a chance to heal his own mental wounds.

Hermione Granger was unquestionably the most intelligent witch to attend Hogwarts in centuries. Regrettably, she had her own blind spots. Among them, not realizing that the wizarding world had no experience with non-magical standard communications, and that each and every one of these men and women would mistakenly think they'd received a PERSONAL letter from Harry Potter himself!

The next day, Hogwarts received three times the already staggering amount of mail that had come yesterday for Harry.

Newly-appointed Headmistress Minerva McGonagall had been quite acerbic about the whole thing, which strangely reassured Harry, and he had promptly turned over the whole problem over to her. Giving a proper Scottish sniff over the entire business, the Headmistress invoked Hogwarts rules over mail, directing Harry to give her a list of those specific people he wanted to receive letters from, and using magic that banned anyone else from sending mail to the castle for Harry. This magic also closed other loopholes, such as others in the castle receiving mail that was intended for the Boy-Who-Lived.

A deeply relieved Harry Potter soon found himself back to having only a few letters a day by owl post that he was willing to answer, and a casual comment from the Headmistress a week later was made by the woman that now only a few hundred unwanted letters a day managed to get through to Hogwarts. Harry didn't ask or care what happened to those letters. Maybe McGonagall was making the house elves eat them.


	2. Chapter 2

In his chair at the house in Number 12 Grimmauld Place, Harry allowed a thin smile to flicker over his features, until he sighed and his face returned to showing glumness. At that time last year, his happiness over solving the problem of the mail had quickly ended, over a more pressing concern. He couldn't leave Hogwarts.

Any attempts for Harry to live his personal life away from the castle, in visiting Hogsmeade, Diagon Alley and its environs, at his friends' homes, or any other place in the wizarding world, always promptly came to an end in the sudden materializing of a mob of cheering wizards and witches that wanted to personally thank him for killing Voldemort.

Harry had always disliked his notoriety as the Boy-Who-Lived, if only because nobody seemed to realize this was accompanied with the title of My-Mum-And-Dad-Were-Murdered, but now his new reputation as The-Death-Of-The-Dark-Lord was making his life truly hellish. There was no privacy at all. Every single action, comment, and appearance by Harry anywhere outside Hogwarts was covered in great detail by the Daily Prophet and the other newspapers and media of the wizarding world. This lead to greater interest in Harry Potter by the magical humans of Great Britain, with these people becoming even more determined to meet the young man in person.

Meetings were tolerable, barely, but things went well past that. Being stared at, overhearing comments about how skinny he was and why his hair was like that, people grabbing his hand to shake it much too firmly, asking him to pose with them while Aunt Edna took a wizarding photo of a young man grimacing in the too-tight grasp of an overwrought witch with liver-and-onions breath, and everything else that the people he'd saved from Tom Riddle were doing while crowding around Harry Potter soon turned the youth's irritation into distinct loathing.

The very last straw had been the Daily Prophet's breathless declaration of Harry James Potter as the Number One Bachelor Wizard in the whole world. The groping by females had commenced right after that, accompanied by the flashing, which wouldn't have been all that bad, if these actions had been confined to pretty, young witches. True horror began when ugly, old witches started joining in. Along with a few wizards a little light on their feet.

After being rescued several times from over-enthusiastic crowds by teams of Aurors throwing wide-area muscle-spasm hexes, the last occasion when he was running for his life in Diagon Alley while wearing only a single sock and clutching to his otherwise nude body a shred of his ripped-off robe that barely maintained his modesty, Harry Potter had returned to Hogwarts and stayed there for the rest of the school year. His mood hadn't been improved by nearly every girl of the four houses of the castle clipping to their bedposts that animated photograph taken by the Daily Prophet during the riot of a sprinting Harry showing one of the tightest bums in existence, created by daily Quidditch practice.

Besides Ginny's support over it all, despite having to prevent her from hexing the entire female student population at the castle, Harry firmly believed that flying saved his sanity, along with participating in house Quidditch matches. It was strangely comforting that his teammates just didn't care if he'd killed a hundred Dark Lords or if he was actually a half-troll, half-dragon, as long as he kept winning games for them. Even being the direct target for every bludger by the opposing teams was a lot easier than going up against He-Who-Created-Such-An-Idiotic-Name.

Still, by his graduation, with every possible wizard and witch who could bribe, talk, and threaten their way into the Hogwarts ceremony, just so they could proudly say they'd been there to see H*A*R*R*Y*P*O*T*T*E*R, that young man had glumly realized there was no real place in the wizarding world for him.

Hermione had been the one to gently point this out to him, using the example of the James Bond movie re-release they were seeing a week before graduation, since only Muggle places were safe for him. In the movie theatre, she had whispered to him, over the sound of gunfire, as Ron and Ginny had watched in fascination while Sean Connery saved the day, that Harry had as much chance of becoming a successful Auror as the actor on the screen would have had in joining a British spy agency in real life. In their own ways, both males were just too well known to the populace at large for either to do an effective job.

If Harry did join the Ministry of Magic as an Auror, or in any other position at that agency where he could actually do some useful work, such as an Unspeakable, he would certainly be given an impressive title and a luxurious office, but he would never be allowed into the field or into any real work that might cause problems for the ministry if something harmful were to happen to a treasured part of the British wizarding society.


	3. Chapter 3

After leaving Hogwarts, it had all wound up with Harry currently stuck in Number 12 Grimmauld Place, which was safe for him since nobody but the Order of the Phoenix knew where it was. At least, those members of the order that had survived the last battle with Voldemort. A descending sense of depression now only aggravated the last member of the Potter family.

There just wasn't anything for him to do, see, or visit. He didn't need to work, with his family vault overflowing with wizarding currency. His friends had their own lives, and Ginny was busy finishing her education at Hogwarts. He couldn't go to any magical location in Britain without serious disguises, and from the way it was pissing outside, going to Muggle places risked becoming totally soaked.

"Harry Potter Dies Of Damp," sardonically said Harry into thin air. "Obviously, a last plot of He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named-Even-With-A-Towel-Wrapped-Around-Your-Head was successful yesterday, as the great and powerful boy wizard caught his death of cold, forgetting his sweater personally made by Molly Weasley, wife of Arthur Weasley, Minister of Magic. See picture at left, and isn't that such a tasty bum?"

The man in the armchair wryly chuckled at how the Daily Prophet would surely begin his front-page obituary, and then he sighed. Absently, Harry tried to recall the last time he'd been this bored. After some thought, the young wizard decided it had been when he, Ron, and Hermione had been on the run after their successful attempt to get into the Ministry of Magic and Umbridge's office to find the locket horcrux. Right after that, they'd had to hide in the countryside in their magical tent, moving around to keep from being found by Voldemort's forces. Oddly, despite being in deadly peril most of the time, that whole period had been extremely tedious, with nothing for any of them to do but to try to come up with some kind of plan on how to get the rest of the horcruxes.

Harry's lips twisted in sardonic humor, as he recalled during that time of Ron's astonishment that neither Harry nor Hermione had ever heard of or read a book of wizarding children's stories called 'The Tales of Beedle the Bard.' The young woman had dryly pointed out to her boyfriend that she and Harry had spent most of their lives in the Muggle world, and they knew more of the children's stories told in that place than anything written in the wizarding world.

Unconsciously, the man in the chair grinned, as he remembered how the pair had then managed to pass the time back then by telling Ron about Snow White, Sleeping Beauty, Puss in Boots, and The Cat In The Hat. Harry himself had been a little startled on how much he'd known, considering the Dursleys had certainly never done anything so caring as reading children's stories to their detested ward. Hermione had suggested the green-eyed boy had simply picked up his knowledge by osmosis from other children during his youth.

A few more minutes had been spent in explaining to Ron what 'osmosis' was. While the redhead boy had been thinking that over, Harry had idly asked Hermione what she'd done as a girl when she'd been bored. Just after asking that question, Harry realized the answer, and resigned himself to being told, "Reading, of course!"

Instead, back then Hermione had looked a little nostalgic, and she'd told Harry that on rainy days, she and her mother would go up to the attic of their house, and the little girl would be allowed to poke around in the fascinating chests and boxes holding her family's possessions, going back several generations. Her mother would tell stories about the pictures, clothing, and keepsakes Hermione pulled out of the boxes. When she'd finished telling Harry this, the young man became alarmed at how sad Hermione now looked, plus her eyes began filling with tears.

At that time, Harry had cursed himself for reminding the girl she'd been forced to modify her parents' memories and send them to Australia to keep them safe from Voldemort's followers. Frantically trying to think of something to say to get Hermione's mind off this, Harry had never been so grateful to Ron at that moment for that member of the Weasley family to suddenly clear his throat and ask, "Um, 'Mione, I've got a question about one of the stories you told me."

Harry and Hermione had then looked at Ron, who had a thoughtful expression on his face. Absently brushing away a tear from the corner of her eye, the young woman had huskily asked, "What, Ron?"

In a serious tone that seemed not to notice anything amiss with his girlfriend, Ron slowly said, "The one with the girl on her way to her grandmother's house, who finds a wolf in the bed waiting for her. Well, what I want to know is, if she WALKED there, why is she called Little Red RIDING Hood?"

Both Harry and Hermione stared at the young man looking hopefully back at them, and then the young woman had opened her mouth to snap at her boyfriend for asking such an idiotic question. Abruptly, Hermione had closed her mouth, and from the pensive look that had suddenly appeared on her face, she was actually thinking it over.

Harry had stared at Hermione's unexpected absorption, and then his gaze had shifted to Ron's features, who was expectantly waiting for an answer from his engrossed girlfriend. The left side of his best friend's face, which was hidden from Hermione but in Harry's vision, now shifted to give the Boy-Who-Lived a knowing wink.


	4. Chapter 4

Back in Number 12 Grimmauld Place, Harry Potter roared with laughter at a rare happy memory in his life. His laughter soon subsided into chuckles that were abruptly cut off, as Harry stiffened in his chair as an idea burst into his mind. Why not do something like that, investigate this house's attic?

Harry had actually gotten halfway out of his chair in his eagerness, until he dejectedly fell back into it, his glumness returning as two objections to this suddenly appeared in his head. The first was that during the thorough cleaning Molly Weasley and the rest of the Order of the Phoenix had given this house years ago, all magical items found that were interesting or dangerous had been removed and turned over to Dumbledore for study. Even if there was something out of the ordinary remaining for Harry to examine, this led to the second objection. Namely, that whatever of interest would have belonged to the Black family.

In his chair, Harry grimaced. With the sole exception of Sirius, his godfather, the other members of the Black descendants and ancestors had absolutely no appeal for the son of Lily and James Potter. Many of that clan throughout the generations had held the deepest of Dark sympathies and support, and even those who hadn't walked on the side of evil had tolerated those of their kin which had done so. During his entire life, Harry had more than enough of fighting against minions of wickedness. He didn't need to search out additional reminders and mementoes of malevolence in someone's attic.

Slumping back in his seat, Harry idly drummed the fingers of his right hand against the armrest and stared out the window, dolefully observing that it seemed to be raining even harder outside. It really was a pity he couldn't spend some time poking around his family's effects and belongings. Unfortunately, all these seemed to have been destroyed along with the family home in Godric's Hollow when it had all started back then for baby Harry, last of the Potter family.

*Wait a second!*

The man seated in the armchair sat bolt upright. Actually, there was one place of Potter history and possessions that had never been touched by any enemy. His family vault in Gringotts, the Goblin Bank.

Harry sprang from his seat, excitedly giving an exultant whoop, as he now stood grinning out of the room window. In all the time since his first visit with Hagrid to the place where the wizarding world kept their money, Harry simply never had the chance or opportunity to thoroughly explore his family vault. During his few visits, it had been necessary to accomplish whatever needed to be done as quickly as possible, so he had simply stayed at the front of the vault to gather any needed funds, and he'd then left, without paying any further attention to whatever might have been in there.

Thinking it over, Harry could vaguely recall a deep room filled with various objects -- mostly gold coins and jewels in various containers closest to the vault door, but there had been the suggestion of larger trunks and boxes further into the vault, along with more items in shelves in the center of the space and attached to the walls. He'd never been able to see all the way to the back of the room. By Merlin, there could be ANYTHING in there!

Briskly striding out of the sitting room, Harry headed down the lower main house corridor towards the front door. He stopped by this entrance at a side table, snatching up his wallet lying there. While the leather object looked like a common Muggle item for holding money, identification and credit cards, this unremarkable folding case was itself worth considerably more than the entire building at Number 12.

With good reason. After Voldemort's fall, Harry had vowed to himself that he would never again stick his nose outside his current living quarters without the capacity of being comfortable, whatever happened. He'd had more than enough of living rough, and the man was determined to have the best, no matter the cost. So, at that time Harry had headed to a small, discreet shop in Diagon Alley that he'd been assured sold the finest Undetectable Extension Charms on whatever case or box the customer wished, adding any possible room, dwelling space, and amenities the buyer could possibly think of to this container.

Harry hadn't even bothered. When the fuss over his appearance had settled down, and he'd been asked for his specific wishes, Harry had simply said, "Everything."

The bill had almost been worth it, just for him to see a wizarding proprietor faint.

In the house corridor, Harry placed his wallet in his back jeans pocket, giving the bulge there a fond pat, as deserving for a fifty-room mansion, fully stocked with anything anybody could imagine to lavishly support a wizard and a hundred or so of his closest family, friends, and visitors for several centuries.

Though, as the proprietor had handed over the completed wallet, the shop owner had actual regret in his voice when he'd murmured that due to security measures, no one had yet figured out a way to populate the mansion with "….ah, members of the fairer sex, but our craftsmen are working most closely with the owners of Casa Veelajo, the most luxurious and exclusive wizarding residence of assignation, an abode of the most beautiful human women and other female beings in the magical world, and they report that a solution is virtually on hand. Perhaps you would wish to be discreetly notified when such an happy event occurs? You merely need to place your name on here…."

Harry had almost broken his thumb and index finger grabbing the quill pen and he'd actually been about to sign his name on the specific line in the sales contract, until his sanity had managed to reassert itself, reminding Harry that if Ginny ever found out about this, she wouldn't restrain herself to just one orifice of his body while casting her most ferocious Bat-Bogey Hex on him.

Oh, well, at least they'd thrown in a good anti-pickpocketing spell free of charge.


	5. Chapter 5

Grinning, Harry grabbed his outside robe off the wall hook and struggled into it. While he could use the Floo system, or even apparate, to Diagon Alley, he'd been inside the house all day, and there was no telling how long he'd be at the bank. A good walk, even in these rainy conditions, would give him a chance for some fresh air. Also, nobody in the wizarding world would think it strange in this weather for somebody to be completely bundled up, so he wouldn't be recognized along the way. Plus, if any non-magical human in the Muggle world caught sight of him, they wouldn't bat an eye at seeing somebody totally wrapped up in a robe during the rain, so that was all right, too. Well, on to Gringotts!

*Ooops.*

Harry actually had his hand on the doorknob to open the door, until he finally remembered something. This was the first time he'd visited that bank in person since his previous visit. *You know, that occasion when you broke into Bellatrix LeStrange's vault and flew away with one of their guardian dragons, causing a really impressive amount of damage along the way to the Goblins' place of business. Things like that caused them to be a tad stroppy over the whole affair. I really don't think they'll be throwing me a welcoming party if I go there today.*

The man in the robe stood uncertainly before the front door, mulling it over. After the battle between Voldemort and Hogwarts' defenders, one of the rare allowed owl posts that had unerringly found him at Hogwarts in the Great Hall had been a stiff letter from Gringotts. Apparently they'd been waiting to see who'd won, in the usual business-obsessed Goblin fashion. Well, since it had been Harry, HE had been the one to receive the bill for all damages, fines, fees, penalties, assessments, and charges those grasping, acquisitive, gold-lusting creatures could possibly invent over that incident.

Harry Potter hadn't known there were that many zeroes in existence.

Fortunately, before anybody could see the Boy-Who-Lived do something really unmanly, like bursting out crying while starting to suck on his thumb, the letter had been twitched out of his numb grasp by Kingsley Shacklebolt, who'd been visiting Hogwarts on Ministry of Magic business at that moment, including recognizing Professor McGonagalls' appointment as Headmistress. He'd been talking to Harry just before the owl had dropped the Gringotts letter right into that young man's hands. Glancing at the letter, the eyebrows of the tall black wizard had lifted at the full amount claimed, but he'd gruffly told Harry, "Don't worry, Mr. Potter. The Ministry will pay those little bas-- Hem. I mean, those truly honest and reasonable holders of most of the mortgages of the wizarding world."

Gaping at Shacklebolt, Harry had seriously considered falling at the wizard's feet and kissing his boots, but he'd managed to refrain from this, though the young man stuttered out, "How….how….are you going to possibly pay that?"

Waving a hand dismissively, Shacklebolt shrugged, and said with a glint in his eye, "Oh, we'll manage. The seizure and confiscation of all of the deceased and captured Death Eaters' property and assets will cover most or even all of it, I think. The Ministry is NOT going to repeat the mistakes of our past in dealing with those criminals. Nobody is going to buy their way out of their crimes this time, even if they escape being Kissed or sent to Azkaban."

"Thank you!" gratefully said Harry, not just over escaping having to pay such a stupendous bill, but also at learning that the Ministry of Magic was finally carrying out its responsibilities of protecting and safeguarding its citizens.

"No, Mr. Potter," said Shacklebolt, with a grave face and a serious tone. "Thank YOU."

Well, that seemed to be the end of it. A month or so later, Harry had received a curt acknowledgement from Gringotts and a receipt, both confirming that the bill had been paid in full, and he'd been more than happy to forget about it all. He'd heard that the bank had been fully repaired since then. Now, he had to go back to a place that scared him more than Voldemort himself. Tom had just wanted to kill him and take over the wizarding world. The Goblins already owned everything in magical Great Britain, and killing someone was just the least of their punishments, if only because corpses couldn't pay their due bills.

"Come on, Harry," muttered the man to himself, as he forced himself to open the door and step outside into the storm. "You can do this. You're the Boy-Who-Lived, not the Boy-Who-Pissed-His-Drawers-And-Blubbered-Like-A-Baby over having to face the Goblins. Buck up, man! 'Cry, God for Harry, England and Saint George!'"

A very unimpressed sky promptly dumped several gallons of rain directly onto Harry's head. It wasn't a good omen.


	6. Chapter 6

Harry was momentarily amused by how miserable the goblin doorkeeper looked standing in front of the bank in the pouring rain. However, his attention was primarily caught by how Gringotts appeared to be the same impressive structure since he'd first seen it nearly a decade ago, with the imposing white building of marble seemingly showing no sign of any repairs or needed work done over Harry's last visit.

Standing apprehensively across the street from the bank, Harry finally heaved a sigh, and stepped toward the front doors of his destination. The doorkeeper seemingly paid no attention to the fully-covered wizard approaching, and Harry entered Gringotts, with a drying spell causing every drop of water on his robe to evaporate the instant he passed through the doorway.

Thankfully, due to the vile weather outside, the bank was virtually deserted, with only a few wizards and witches conducting their financial business on the ground floor. Most of the tellers were idle, and as Harry passed down the room towards the reception desk, he could feel beady eyes watching the tall wizard with his hood pulled over his features walk past the bank clerks. Another of these wizened office workers, a young Goblin that Harry had never seen before, that was seated at the reception desk, waited for Harry to stop in front of the desk before brusquely asking, "What is your business here, wizard?"

Harry gathered up his courage, and lifted his hands to toss back his robe's hood, steadily saying, "I'm Harry Potter, and I wish to visit my vault."

He'd never before seen a Goblin's mouth fall open in sheer shock. Considering these creatures had evidently never heard of dentists, Harry could have done without the experience of looking down into this orifice with its yellow-stained teeth. Fortunately, this lasted only a few seconds, before the Goblin abruptly shut its mouth and shot up from its seat, stuttering, "Wait….wait…here! I need to call my superior!" Right after that, the Goblin scuttled away from the desk, towards a private door in the near wall.

This left Harry standing in front of the reception desk and staring ahead, seemingly waiting patiently for this promised senior manager. In reality, he was trying to ignore the sudden whispers that were now coming from behind him, not just from the humans who'd realized who he was, but also from the Goblin tellers who were also murmuring together. Harry could feel a flush beginning to creep up the back of his neck.

After a few more uncomfortable moments, with the only good thing being that nobody else approached him, for any reason, a flicker of motion was seen by Harry out of the corner of his eye. The door in which the young Goblin had vanished through now opened, with the selfsame creature coming through it, leading another Goblin that was older and dressed in a more ornate Gringotts uniform that showed this manager was much higher ranking in the bank's hierarchy than the clerk it was following. An instant later, Harry managed to recognize this new Goblin.

Now, it was the human's turn for his mouth to fall open.

"GRIPHOOK?!"

Smiling tightly, the named Goblin took his seat at the desk, waving off the younger member of his species, saying, "All right, Lockshott, I'll handle this." As the lower-ranking bank clerk left, Griphook leaned back in his seat, folded his arms across his chest, and calmly gazed at the human staring in shock at the Goblin.

The last time Harry had seen Griphook, he'd run off with the Sword of Gryffindor after they'd escaped from Bellatrix's vault, shouting to the oncoming party of Goblins summoned by their break-in that Harry, Ron, and Hermione were thieves. The only way the three humans could escape was to free the guardian dragon and climb aboard it, having this beast fly them all out of the bank. The wizard hadn't given the Goblin the slightest thought after that, which was why Harry was so stunned at seeing him again.

Stuttering, Harry managed to say, "What -- what are you DOING here, Griphook?!"

A tilt of the Goblin's head was the only sign of puzzlement shown by the creature intently watching Harry, and his composed voice answered, "I work here, Mr. Potter."

Harry weakly said, "Even after all what happened? With the sword and the break-in and the dragon--"

"I was praised for my initiative in acquiring the Sword of Gryffindor, the property of the Goblins!" snapped Griphook. Glowering at Harry, the non-human growled, "Despite the limited time I managed to possess it."

"Um," was contributed by Harry, who only now realized that he'd never wondered exactly how that sword had managed to be transported from belonging to Griphook to be held by the Sorting Hat at the Battle of Hogwarts and given to Neville so that he could use it to kill Nagini. From the sour look given to him by Griphook, Harry suspected the Goblin wasn't going to answer any questions about the weapon.


	7. Chapter 7

Hastily trying to come up with something else to fill the uncomfortable silence between the two, Harry frowned, and asked, "What about our sneaking into here? You said yourself you didn't want to be part of a theft from Gringotts."

The Goblin slowly smiled at Harry, revealing a great many pointy teeth, and he lifted a skinny finger in a gesture of ordering attention, as he cackled, "I managed to convince my superiors that an attempted theft was going to happen anyway, with you and your friends being so determined about it, and it was necessary to come along to keep an eye on you all. Plus, from witnessing everything, I was able to provide information on exactly how you accomplished your thievery." The Goblin's lips pulled back further in increasing grim glee, revealing even more sharp teeth, as Griphook smugly added, "You may be sure that our safeguards and precautions have been upgraded so that anyone else using those exact tactics as back then performed by you and the others will now end in total and terminal failure."

Harry couldn't help being irritated by Griphook's self-satisfaction, and the man grumbled, "And I suppose you managed to talk yourself out of any responsibility for what we did with the dragon, bringing down this place?"

There were few things as spine-chilling as a Goblin snickering evilly to itself, Harry now learned. After a few moments, Griphook had finished his sounds of mirth to beam at the annoyed human. Leaning forward, the Goblin said in a gloating whisper, "Ah, I prefer to think of that as my masterpiece. I merely pointed out that the culprit was quite capable of paying for his misdeeds, and if that dunned wizard refused a proper invoice, the seized contents of his vault would cover handily the costs of the entire rebuilding."

Harry stiffened in shock, and blurted out at the grinning Goblin, "YOU'RE the one who thought up that bill!"

"And it was paid," nodded a contented Griphook, who now leaned back in his seat and interlocked his fingers over his stomach, resting his hands against his ornate attire signifying his new, much higher rank at the bank. "Admittedly, not from you, but who cared? As long as the funds were received, that was all that mattered. We've rebuilt, and during that process, I was granted a most longed for promotion, demonstrating the immense respect I now possess in Goblin society."

Harry stared in utter astonishment at Griphook. Dazedly, the wizard finally realized that despite their form, the Goblins were NOT human, and they didn't think like humans. Harry winced at the thought of what the wizarding world would do to someone who basically went through the Ministry of Magic building with a bulldozer and a flamethrower. *Uh, you DID do something like that, when you broke in there, looking for Sirius and the prophecy. I think only Voldemort showing up kept us from being sent to Azkaban back then.*

Harry's uncomfortable thoughts were interrupted by Griphook's patient inquiry. "Well, Mr. Potter, I presume that you have business with us today?"

He was really becoming tired about all these shocks. Still, Harry managed to rally, to disbelievingly ask, "What, that's IT? Everything's forgiven and forgotten?"

"Business is business, Mr. Potter," shrugged Griphook. "All debts have been settled, and I believe Gringotts can look forward to a long and fruitful relationship with the last surviving member of one of the oldest wizarding families." The Goblin now looked expectantly at Harry.

Sighing, and rubbing distractedly at the lightning-shaped scar on his forehead, Harry finally gave in. He muttered, "I just wanted to visit my vault today."

"Of course, Mr. Potter. I presume you have your vault key?"

At Griphook's question, Harry nodded and pulled out from his jeans pocket this small vault door opener, embossed with the Potter seal. Satisfied, the Goblin waved a hand, and an instant later, the other lower-ranking Goblin bank clerk swiftly appeared at the side of the reception desk, quivering in anticipation at Griphook's orders. "Lockshott, escort Mr. Potter to his vault. Will that be all, sir?"

At the manager's inquiring look, Harry hesitated, and then he said, "It won't be a short visit like my usual. I don't know how long I'll be in there."

"That's not a problem. Whenever you leave, just close the vault door and wait at the platform outside it. That will send a magical signal, and in a few minutes, a goblin and a cart will appear to pick you up. Whatever the time, you will be escorted out of Gringotts. I hope this gives satisfaction, sir."

Harry looked narrowly at the Goblin, wondering if he was being sarcastic. The solemn expression on Griphook's features conveyed only professionalism in his work in serving the wizarding world, and Harry decided to take this at face value. The last of the Potters said politely, "Thank you, Griphook. I'm sure we'll be seeing each other again, and I expect that things will go well in the future."

Griphook nodded in acceptance at this peace offering, and watched in silence as Harry left the desk, guided by his young Goblin escort.

As he walked through Gringotts, Harry was lost in thought over what had just happened. After a few moments, the man's lips began to twitch, as he was struck by the humor of it all. Of how a Goblin managed to land on his feet despite everything, being rewarded for all his efforts no matter how criminal they were, and showing a supreme example of that in a dragon-eat-dragon world, it was every Goblin for itself.

An actual grin was now on Harry's face, as he headed towards the cart that would take him down to his vault. Not just over feeling relieved how well things had gone, plus laughing inside over Griphook's success, but also that he soon would have another enjoyable roller-coaster ride down to where his family assets and possessions were stored.

Which, at this moment, included a magical booby-trap that was patiently awaiting Harry.


	8. Chapter 8

Twenty years ago:

"Prongs is going to kill us, you know."

"Yup."

"And after that, Lily is going to skin our corpses and use the hides for throw rugs."

"Yup."

"I'll have to roam the earth for eternity as the ghost of Remus Lupin, with only you for company."

"Yup."

"You've been watching too many of those Muggle shifties, with that Wayne Johnson actor."

"Yup."

"WHY THE HELL ARE YOU DOING THIS?!!!"

"BECAUSE THE HONOR OF THE MARAUDERS IS AT STAKE, THAT'S WHY! BWAH-HAH-HAH-HAH!"

"Sirius, that cackle alone is reason enough why James and Lily made us swear on our magic that we wouldn't play any pranks on them during their wedding and their honeymoon."

"Made us? They rammed their wands halfway up our noses and threatened that unless we swore to behave, they'd set our brains on fire!"

"It certainly got your attention didn't it?"

"I prefer to think it cleared my mind to identify the loophole big enough to shove Hogwarts through it, that nothing was said about the wedding reception. I can't understand how James missed it, but I have strong suspicions that planning for his wedding softened his brain. Never get married, Remus, my lad."

"Not much chance of that, you know."

"Sorry."

"Yes, anyway, what exactly are you doing? And do I need an alibi?"

"Oh, relax. I'm sure that James and Lily are still keeping a close eye on us here, but that means their suspicions will be lulled when they see us at the back of the room, acting perfectly innocent, when they open their wedding gifts."

"Oh, Merlin."

"No, no, it'll be fun, I promise you. See, I set up in my gift a portkey with an Identical Location charm. Once those two get close enough, they'll be transported to another wedding reception."

"Another? Where?"

"Anywhere in the world, to any possible reception. Not just in the wizarding world, but to any Muggle one."

"Uh, Sirius, I think, as usual, that I need to be the voice of sanity at this moment. That risks breaking the Statute of Secrecy--"

"Do you take me for an amateur? They'll appear in a deserted room at the reception, and once they carry out their task, all they have to do is to return to that room, or somewhere else where there's nobody, and they'll come back right away. A closet will do fine, like this one you just pulled me into. Speaking of closets, I have to say the darkness and the smell of mothballs here reminds me of good times back at Hogwarts. You're not really my type, but since we're here, do you fancy a quick snog?"

"I'm warning you, Sirius-- Wait. What'd you say, about a task?"

"What would be the fun of just sending them somewhere? I put another charm in the prank that tells them both what they have to do at that reception to come back here. At most, it'll take them just a few minutes to find the others, do what they need to do, and return."

"What others?"

"The other bride and groom, who have to be kissed by James and Lily."

"ARE YOU INSANE?!"

"I should hope so. I'd hate to think someone who could come up with such a hilarious prank would be a sensible, staid, somber member of society, particularly since I gave clear instructions in the charm on exactly who our friends had to kiss."

"Well, it doesn't sound all that bad, with the pairs just trading kisses. I mean, every man here from Dumbledore himself down was more than happy to kiss Lily, and James was kissed by every witch who could grab him--"

"No. At that reception, Lily has to kiss the bride, and James has to kiss the groom. Both with a full kiss, right on the lips."

"..…we're dead men."

Giggling, from the other.


	9. Chapter 9

At that exact moment, where in the closet Remus Lupin was demonstrating superhuman restraint in not strangling Sirius Black, a hundred feet away in the main reception room, Vernon Dursley was headed for the gift table, a wrapped package clenched in his meaty fists as he heavily stepped towards the table. This man didn't yet have all the poundage he'd possess in the future, but the Muggle's beefy face was twisted in a dark scowl.

"Bunch of freaks," Vernon muttered to himself, as he came to the table. Well, at least he could finally get rid of his requisite wedding gift (a cheap serving salver), and once that was done, he'd gather up Petunia and they'd make their hurried excuses about having to get back to baby Dudley, and they could at last leave this gathering of the most peculiar and disgusting group of people he'd unfortunately had to ever encounter in his entire life.

Standing by the table, Vernon eyed the gifts that were covering every square inch of the top of this stand. There didn't seem room for him to place his gift. Shrugging his bulky shoulders, Vernon impatiently shoved his package among the gifts, shifting them all and causing another wrapped gift at the far right edge of the table to fall off this piece of furniture, landing with a thump on the floor.

Startled, Vernon glanced around, faintly panicky that he'd possibly attracted attention by this from those weirdos. Fortunately, nobody seemed to be looking in his direction, so Vernon edged around the table and bent over to pick up the gift. Gripping this in his right hand, the Muggle started to straighten up, while at the same time peering around to see if he was still being ignored. Not paying attention to what he was holding, Vernon suddenly had to bite back a pained yelp, as the man smashed both his lifting hand and the gift against the underside of the edge of the table. He distinctly felt a crunch through the gift he was holding.

Now really worried, Vernon snatched up his hand to look at the package, which was definitely crumpled. Hastily patting the gift back into a semblance of its former shape (an action that seemed to produce some more disquieting sounds from the wrapped parcel of it further fracturing), Vernon quickly thrust the gift into the others, jerking his empty hands back, to then nonchalantly stick both of these into his pockets and sidle away from the table, both actions done as innocently as a sixteen-stone man with a brick-red face could attempt. Amazingly enough, this succeeded, with Vernon hearing no hue and cry after him.

Grimly determined, the new brother-in-law of James and Lily Potter went off to find his wife and leave as quickly as possible.

An hour later, Sirius was looking worried, which was making Remus REALLY nervous. From his position next to his best unmarried friend at the back of the crowd watching James and Lily Potter delightedly open their wedding gifts, the werewolf leaned over and hissed out of the corner of his mouth, "What's going on? Why do you look like you're back at Hogwarts at seventh year and you just found out Peeves stole your case of Continuous Cautious Contraceptive charms?"

"How'd you know-- Never mind that! It didn't work!"

"What, the prank? Maybe they haven't opened it yet."

Sirius snapped, "It doesn't need to be opened! All they have to do is to get near it, which they are!"

Remus glanced again at the newly-wedded pair at the table, where he saw Lily Potter look at her wristwatch and turn to whisper into her husband's ear. James Potter stopped reaching for another gift as he listened, and then the man nodded. Looking around the room, the groom produced his wand and used it to amplify his voice. "Gentle witches and wizards, my wife" (that last word was said in a very satisfied tone) "has just told me that we need to get ready for our international Floo connection, so we'll have to stop now. Thank you all for your gifts, and we'll send you a thank-you note to those who haven't had theirs presented. Now, we're going to say good-bye to everyone."

At that, the entire room cheered, and surged forward to cluster around James and Lily for their farewell kisses and handshakes. A very pre-occupied Sirius and Remus were swept up in this for the next few minutes, until soon after, with all of those present waving goodbye and sniffling, and the Potter couple also waving back, the newly-married man and woman apparated out of the room with the usual crack!

Remus was furtively wiping a tear from the corner of his eye until he received a good shot in the ribs from Sirius' elbow, with that member of the Black family otherwise ignoring his friend as the werewolf yelped and rubbed his side, glaring at Sirius steadily watching the table where the wedding gifts rested, both opened and unopened. Gruffly speaking, the animagus said, "Right, this is the perfect time to get the gift back, and find out what went wrong. Come on." At that, Sirius started heading towards the table.

Not moving, Remus cleared his throat and murmured, "Sirius, isn't it extremely tacky for someone to take back their wedding gift?"

Having taken only a couple of steps away, the other wizard stopped short, and looked thoughtful. Nodding, he said, "You're right. We need a plan." His eyes narrowed in concentration for a few moments, until Sirius brightened, and eagerly spoke, "Here's how we'll work it. I'll nip off to the restroom, chew up a handful of soap, and change into a Grim, and then charge into this room, foaming at the mouth. You shout 'Mad dog!', and in the confusion, grab the box off the table, it's the one with the blue bow--"

"…..or we could just go over there, pick it up, and tell anyone who asks that you found out you brought James and Lily a duplicate gift that was shown by an earlier opened gift, and you plan to get them something else. Unless you really want to achieve a lifetime ambition of being blasted by a roomful of wizards and witches throwing hexes and curses at a rabid animal?"

"Smart-arse."

Remus nodded, dryly saying, "Someone has to be, in your company. Let's go." The pair started walking towards the gift table. Neither of them were really paying attention to another person approaching the table, a red-haired witch with a toddler held onto her hip, until this woman stopped and pulled out her wand, and she next pointed this at the table and said something.

Both Sirius and Remus recognized the woman to be Molly Weasley. They were too far away to hear what she'd said, but they were able to watch in absolute horror at what happened next. All of the gifts on the table promptly vanished, disappearing into thin air, and leaving the top of the furniture totally bare.


	10. Chapter 10

Both men rushed towards the now-empty table, startling the woman now bouncing her child and cooing to it. She peered at the desperate looks currently present on the faces of two men she knew very well.

"Hullo, Sirius, Remus," cautiously nodded Molly to two other members of the Order of the Phoenix.

"WHAT DID--mmmfff!" came from Sirius Black, who had started his remarks by shouting at Molly, just before he was cut off by Remus Lupin's hand being firmly clapped over his friend's mouth.

"Ignore Sirius, will you? He's overcome by emotion caused by such a delightful wedding. By the way, what exactly did you do with James and Lily's gifts?" smoothly said Remus, all while holding Sirius paralyzed in a very determined grip on that man's tongue.

Smiling tentatively at the two men, Molly shrugged, and said, "James didn't want to cause anybody the bother of looking after their gifts until he and Lily got back from their honeymoon, so he gave me a limited one-way Floo-package charm set on my wand."

Sirius was now absolutely rigid, his wide eyes flickering at Remus still holding onto his tongue, trying to send a silent message that really didn't need to be passed on anyway, as Remus weakly asked, "Ah, where exactly did you send those gifts?"

"To the Potter vault, of course!" matter-of-factly said Molly. She was momentarily distracted by her child making a grab for her wand, with the woman hastily holding this wooden stick away. Her beaming face turned again towards the two crestfallen men, happily chattering, "By the way, have you met Percy? We were going to name him Percival, but then we thought he'll be known as Percy, anyway, so just that name will do." At that, she shifted her grip on her small boy, holding him out for Sirius and Remus to inspect the child.

Remus' hand had let go of his friend's tongue to drop limply at his side, as both men had their attention come back from staring off hopelessly into the distance into looking at the lad solemnly gazing at the male pair. Blinking at the child, both Remus and Sirius, possessors themselves of names guaranteed to bring ridicule and derision by other children, bestowed by parents not quite realizing exactly the suffering these bearers of their names were going to go through during their childhoods, now glanced at each other, and winced. Then, the men again looked at an expectant Molly, who was evidently awaiting some kind of comment from them.

Clearing his throat, Sirius muttered, "Fine manly name, that. I guarantee he'll become good with his fists, or be a really fast runner-- Ow!" This time, it was the Black family member who glared at Remus looking innocent after casually stepping very hard on his friend's foot.

Different reactions came from the pair of Weasley redheads. Molly just looked puzzled, while the boy in her arms glowered at the man who'd predicted his future, and then Percy Weasley's expression suddenly shifted to intense concentration. A moment later, a horrible smell permeated the air.

Startled, Molly glanced at her son, until she gave him a motherly smile, and cooed to the boy, "Diddums do a boom-boom? Let's get you fixed up. Excuse me, Sirius, Remus…." At that, the woman bustled off towards the lavatories, no longer paying attention to the men she'd left behind, who were holding their noses, hurriedly backpedaling, and frantically waving their free hands in front of their faces, all to escape the toxic cloud created by that young monster now smirking at the Marauders over his mother's shoulder as he was carried away.

Gagging, Sirius wheezed, "Great Merlin, we could win the war in just five seconds if we could ever figure a way to get that kid's bum under You-Know-Who's nose, with that bastard promptly dropping dead after that! Of course, that'd be against the Shangri-La Convention against gas attacks, but I think they'd forgive us--"

A very green Remus Lupin, who was really regretting his werewolf senses at this moment, cut off his friend with something more important. "Forget that! Look, what are we going to do about the prank? It's not like we can drop off a quick note to James on his honeymoon, telling him we need to pop into his family vault for a few minutes, and no, he can't ask us why, just hand over his vault key, and hope he's having a wonderful time!"

"Oh, I don't know," mused Sirius, a very dirty grin now appearing on that man's face as he continued. "If we timed it right, when he's in the middle of a sexual daze after his wedding night with Lily, he just might sign off on anything without thinking about it--"

"I should have removed your tongue when I had the chance!" snapped Remus, really offended at Sirius' indelicate suggestion.

Shrugging, Sirius looked around the reception hall, where the rest of the wedding party were beginning to take their leave. He confided to an irate Remus, "Listen, we can't talk about it here. Let's go back to my house. I've got a bottle of fifty-year firewhiskey that I've been meaning to introduce to my tonsils. With the help of that, maybe we can come up with something to get back the prank."

A ruffled Remus cooled down a little at Sirius' suggestion. Clearly thinking it over, he reluctantly nodded in agreement, though he then glared at his friend and said in a threatening tone, "All right, but I'm warning you, Sirius, if the words of 'Gringotts' and 'break-in' ever come up in the next few hours, I'm going to introduce to you the Muggle concept of the choke chain."

"Ooooo, kinky. I always knew you had hidden depths, Remus."

"Shut up, and let's go."


	11. Chapter 11

Many, many drinks later:

"Well, at leasht we covered our asshesh. You're poshitive it'll work?"

"Yup. That charmed note we sent to Molly for her to pass along to the vault will appear next to the pranked gift, but it'll only go off right after if the prank does, too. I still can't figure out what went wrong--"

"Who caresh? If it never worksh, either of 'em, ish fine with me. Prank off, jusht nice note shaying we had wonderful time at wedding. Prank worksh, maybe it'll keep 'em from grabbin' their wandsh and hexing ush into next year, you arshehole."

"About that, if that prank still works, it'll be with James and Lily in their vault. They'll have been looking over their wedding gifts, maybe remembering their honeymoon, beginning to feel frisky and being totally private in there, with items of clothing then possibly becoming removed--"

"WILL YOU SHUT UP ABOUT IT?!"

"Fine. Then YOU stop hogging the bottle."

Sounds of a glass container being pried out of someone's firm grasp. Glugging.

"Idiotic mishchief mad berk-- Hey."

"Wha'? Hic."

"You never shaid what your gift wash."

"Oh, that. It was one of those newfangled miniature racing brooms, remote controlled by your wand. Spent a fun hour playing with it before I cast the portkey charm and put it back in the box. Chased Kreacher with it around the entire house. Say, I don't remember seeing them open your gift."

"Nup. They didn't get to it before they left. It wash a cushtom penshieve. Went to summa our classhmates during our lasht year at jolly, jolly Hogwartsh. Had 'em remember seein' ush at our table, combined the memoriesh of 'em all, sho when Jamesh and Lilly ushed it, they could walk around table, shee ush from all poshitionsh. Funny thing, bein' able to shee back of your head."

"Hey, that's a really nice gift. Were all of us there?"

"Yup. Me, you, Jamesh, Lily, Peter."

"What happened to that little rat, anyway? I didn't see him after the wedding."

"Dunno. Think he left after that. Didn't look hap-- hap-- happy."

"Oh, well, who cares? Let's toast him, anyway."

"We already done that, Shiriush."

"You sure?"

"We toashted Peter, Dumbledore, Hogwartsh, McGonagall, Moody, the giant shquid, every Weashley we could remember, Dumbledore, the new waitressh at the Three Broomshshticksh, the one with the really big brishtolsh--"

"Stop spitting on me, you wanker. You said Dumbledore twice."

"Toashted him twice, fine man."

"True. Hey! I can't believe it, but we forgot the most important ones! Just when there's only one more drink in the bottle for us both! C'mon, get up on your feet and let me pour this in your glass." Pause. "Will you hold still? All right, now for me. Ready?"

"Yup, pilgrim, a mansh gotta do what a mansh gotta do."

"I didn't know you were listening when I dragged you along to those Muggle shifties. I'll have to teach you the walk next--"

"That wash shupposhed to be a walk? I thought he had sherioush indig-- indegsh-- shtomach problemsh."

"Whatever. Get ready…. TO JAMES AND LILY!"

"TO LAMESH AND JILY!"

Gulp.

Gulp.

"Hic."

"Hic."

Thud.

Thud.

Snoring.


	12. Chapter 12

A generation afterward:

He'd really meant to be methodical about it, honest. Searching through his family vault, examining everything in a systematic and painstaking manner that even Hermione would have approved of, a practical means of checking whatever was in the Gringotts secured room for valuables of the Potter family.

That vow had lasted just to the first photo album.

Sitting cross-legged on the vault floor next to the shelf he'd taken the book from, Harry Potter examined with absolute delight the volume of his family pictures. This was even better than the photo album Hagrid had given him after his first year at Hogwarts. That specific picture book had included only the moving photographs donated by Hogwarts friends of James and Lily Potter, which had necessarily concentrated on images of the pair at the wizarding school and later on in their lives, along with several formal portraits of them with baby Harry.

Now, what he was holding showed Harry what he'd never seen before of his parent's lives, along with other members of the Potter and Evans families. He'd looked with fascination for the first time at images of his paternal grandparents and other distant relatives, many of these stretching back generations. Flicking past the pages of the photo album, Harry had noted with amusement that in the wizarding photos, his father's hair as a boy had been just as messy as his son's would turn out to be.

Wonderingly, he'd stared at still Muggle images of a Lily Evans over her lifetime, from baby pictures where she'd already had a thin crop of reddish hair, to her growing up from a toddler, a girl, and finally to a young woman. More photos along, Harry had to blink at the appearance of a thin-faced girl in the Evans family, who didn't seem to be all that happy about sharing her family life with her big sister. It was clear that Petunia Evans had early on developed the sour look that her nephew was all too familiar with.

Well, at least there weren't any pictures of the Dursleys. Harry let a wry smile pass over his face at how Vernon would have exploded at even the thought of sending family pictures to his detested relatives. At this thought, Harry absently rubbed his rear, numb from an unknown amount of time seated on the vault floor. Shifting his position, the wizard pulled out his wallet from his jeans back pocket and placed this at the bottom of the shelf from which he'd taken the photo album. Then, the man went back to intently examining the images of his family.

About a dozen feet away, if it had been in any way sentient, a twenty-year-old charm could only have been described as quivering in pure frustration. The completion of the sole purpose of its existence was just out of range, sitting innocently without knowing he was near a seriously-damaged prank, that if it was indeed possible to attribute human characteristics to nonhuman objects, this said item would have been best depicted as wearing its underwear on its head and muttering to itself, "Bugrit! Millennium hand and shrimp!"

Being in the ham-fisted grasp of Vernon Dursley can do that to just about anything.

Inside an ornately wrapped gift box, a small wizarding toy in various broken pieces remained ready to accomplish its fractured purpose. The dictionary definition in which that adjective was stated as 'to be damaged, disrupted, or destroyed' certainly applied, especially the word 'disrupted.'

The portkey charm hadn't worked twenty years before because the damage done to it by a clumsy Muggle had caused it to refuse to function unless a single person sharing the same biological make-up of its two original targets had come along. Since that specific person just hadn't been conceived until several weeks later after the wedding reception, it was no wonder why the charm had completely ignored James and Lily Potter. It would work very well on their son, though.

Something not foreseen by a member of the Black family would also work quite well, if not exactly within the limits originally set forth by Sirius. As it had done countless times before, the charm in the Potter vault again scanned its surroundings and once more prepared to send its target via portkey to whatever place best matched the environs of its present location. Though, the damaged charm was perfectly willing to send its hapless victim to somewhere a bit more broadly interpreted than a mischievous wizard would ever have considered.

Sirius Black really shouldn't have put on the charm the instructions of transporting James and Lily Potter to 'any' wedding reception when they'd been in the middle of celebrating their own nuptials. Two decades later, the disrupted charm had now somehow construed 'any' to mean sending its target to 'anywhere' matching its current environment. As in, anywhere in the entire Multiverse.

Finally, regarding the task a giggling Marauder had commanded his best friends to accomplish before they could return and then start looking with murder in their hearts for Sirius, the now-wonky charm had its own mandate on exactly what Harry Potter had to accomplish before it would deign to allow the young wizard to return to his vault.

It should turn out to be a most interesting experience for Harry, if only he'd get off his bum and come juuuuuust a bit closer….


	13. Chapter 13

Standing up, Harry Potter gave himself a good long stretch, his arms lifting up to the low ceiling with a photo album in one hand, as he recovered from several hours being seated on the vault floor. Placing his volume of family pictures back into the shelf where it had previously rested, Harry glanced at his wallet lying on the floor next to the shelf, and reminded himself that when he retreated into the mansion for a meal and a good night's sleep, he should start adding copies of the photo album and other things in the Potter vault to the leather object holding an Undetectable Extension Charm that allowed it to contain an entire building.

Taking a step away, Harry now looked around the vault, deciding on what to investigate next. He didn't bother about his wallet. It wasn't like anybody else was going to come along in the vault and swipe it. The man's eye was caught by numerous gift-wrapped packages resting along another shelf, some of these opened, but a good many still in their original intact wrappings. Curious, Harry ambled over there, until he was just in front of the shelf.

YES!

The prank charm finally accomplished its purpose.

Too fast for him to react, Harry felt the familiar tug behind his navel of an operating portkey.

A few minutes later, in his office, a being sat contently adding to a ledger the most-impressive profits from his recent investments. As the pen scritched on the lined paper, the writer hummed to himself, perfectly happy in his obsolete accountancy. He was quite aware of those newfangled business machines that were supposed to help office workers, 'computers' as they were called. This individual softly snorted to himself, since he was old enough to remember when that word had specifically meant somebody who calculated numbers or amounts using an old-style adding machine. Not that he'd ever needed one. As long as he could remember, he'd always been able to sweep a glance across a column of numbers and accurately add up the total in his mind in a flash. Which had been the reason he'd managed to find a starting job as an office clerk when he'd been a young lad, and that had begun his dizzying rise in business.

The writer's pen paused, as the main objection to buying such machines again appeared in his head: computers were expensive, and it wasn't like he was ever going to run out of paper and ink. Particularly the latter, when on one of his first foreign business ventures, in the far-off desolate country that was named Stanstan (translation: Land of Stans), he'd managed to find and drill into an immense underground pool of pure writing ink, with the well producing hundreds of gallons a day of the black liquid. Decades later, that ink well was still going strong, so it made no sense why he should have to discard something that worked--

!!!!!!!!!

The person in the office chair jerked up in shock, producing an large inkblot on the sheet of paper he was writing (a good ha'penny lost there!), and he stared with alarm at the immense map of his business facilities that covered the entire far wall of the office. Numerous tiny light bulbs marked and showed every important part of the map, and right now, a blazing red light was blinking in the middle of his establishment.

He had an intruder.

Hastily pressing a switch laid on the top of his desk that cut off the ear-splitting burglar alarm, the extremely angry executive jumped out of his seat and dashed towards the left wall, stopping short of this partition to lift off his personal weapon from the wall hooks holding the also-obsolete gun ready for use. Despite this weapon's extreme age, it was a faithful and trusted tool, and he wouldn't trade it for anything newer and more lethal. Not that the gun wasn't sufficient to express the wielder's extreme displeasure.

Sprinting out of his office, along the way, this person slowed down only a fraction in his rush while passing through the door, as he juggled his weapon to leave his left arm free for that appendage to grab his top hat from the hat stand by the door and firmly plunk that black headwear on top of his skull. Now girded for action, the executive disappeared down the office corridor to confront his trespasser, with the light of coming battle in the eyes of that irate financier glinting through the pince-nez on his elderly face.

Several minutes earlier, Harry had lost his balance the instant he'd come to a stop at wherever the portkey had sent him. Beside the usual unsteadiness after a trip by that magical construct, the very ground itself had shifted under his feet. Beginning his fall, Harry could do nothing but loudly express a one-word opinion of "SHITE!" as he promptly curled up into a ball and wrapped his arms around his head as he began his roll down the small hill where he'd appeared on its summit.

At least years of Quidditch had trained him to take falls. Harry still wasn't in a happy mood as he tumbled head over heels down the hill, with the material that made up this small knoll beginning to trail after him in a minor avalanche. Finally, the young wizard slammed to a stop at the bottom of the hill on his back, his breath being punched out of him by his abrupt halt. An instant later, the avalanche overtook him, half-burying Harry, leaving only the front of his upper body mostly clear, though there were still numerous objects covering him there.

Abruptly jerking his upper body forward that sent debris spraying away from him in all directions, a furious Harry began brushing himself off, until he stopped short in sheer shock, staring in total astonishment at what he was now holding in his right hand, a bit of what material that had been covering him.

It was a silver coin.

"What in Merlin's name….?" Disbelieving whispering this, Harry finally looked around himself.

He was lying at the bottom of a small hill about twenty feet high made entirely of silver coins, exactly like that specific disk he was holding. To the sides, and in front of him, were also hills consisting of these pieces of currency, just as high and broad as the hill he'd tumbled down. Shakily getting to his feet, as coins poured off his body, Harry bewilderedly looked around. The only new thing he noticed was that he was at the edge of a small valley between the hills, with a bare concrete floor for the ground.

Squeezing his eyes shut, Harry made himself concentrate on exactly how he'd gotten here. He'd felt a portkey--

In a blur, the wizard drew his wand from his arm holster and held it ready, as Harry snapped open his eyes, pointing his weapon directly ahead of himself, and then sweeping it and his body to the sides, as he intently glanced around. Was this the work of one of the Death Eaters who'd managed to escape? Or some other enemy of Harry's, new or old? Well, whatever, they'd find a very angry wizard waiting for them, just itching to try out his strongest curses and hexes.

Nothing happened.

After a few moments, the tenseness of the wizard's body gradually relaxed, though he remained wary, and the young man kept his wand in front of him. Cautiously, Harry stepped forward into the middle of the valley between the hills of money. Once he was there, he could now look both up and down the valley, where several hundred feet away on both sides of even more money piled in hills, he could see concrete walls going up, and up, and….up….

Now with his head tilted way back to look straight up, Harry could do nothing but gape at the far-off ceiling of the immense structure he was inside, as the man numbly wondered, *Merlin, are those CLOUDS up there?*

"HANDS UP, OR I'LL BLAST YOU WITH BUCKSHOT!"

Hastily straightening his body, Harry promptly thrust his arms upwards into the air. That bellowed threat coming from directly behind himself had been delivered with total seriousness, in an extremely menacing tone that indicated whoever had delivered the command had MEANT it. Harry didn't dare to do anything but obey. Still, he had his wand….

"Oh, so now she's sending someone else to do her dirty work?!" was snarled from behind Harry. "Listen, laddie, I want you to very slowly bend your upper body forward, keeping your arms straight and totally frozen, until you can put your wand down. That blasted thing had better not twitch the slightest, and if you even open your mouth…. Well, it won't be good for you, understand that?" All of this had been delivered in a very intimidating growling voice, that for some reason to a very nervous and worried Harry had sounded exactly like a fellow citizen of both Hagrid and Headmistress McGonagall's native land.

Numbly, Harry followed his orders, placing his wand on the concrete floor, and then straightening up while still holding his arms high, to then take a few steps backwards, all as commanded by the unknown person holding him at gunpoint and still snapping out orders as if it had never occurred to this individual that he would ever be disobeyed. Harry unhappily decided his captor had reason for his clear confidence, considering how easily he'd rendered the wizard helpless. And how had he possibly known who -- what Harry was, and about his wand?

"All right, laddie, turn around -- keep those hands high! -- and I'll march you out of here on your way to prison!"

Harry cautiously did so, with the man beginning to open his mouth to try to explain to his captor that he hadn't meant any harm, and he'd been sent here -- wherever that was! -- without his consent. When that Harry finally saw who was holding him prisoner, the wizard couldn't even start to speak. Instead, the man's jaw dropped fully open, with him staring in a total daze at the being standing before the wizard.

Harry James Potter, Order of Merlin, The-Boy-Who-Lived, the death of Lord Voldemort, heir of Albus Dumbledore, the hope of the wizarding world, had encountered a great many strange creatures in his whole tumultuous life of magic, spells, and wizardry.

He'd never before met a blunderbuss-wielding, top-hatted, red-coat-wearing, five-foot talking duck. With no trousers on.

Still holding his arms up high, Harry managed to bleat out, "WHO -- WHAT are you?! And where in Merlin's name am I?!"

Keeping his bell-mouthed gun steadily pointed at his captive's stomach, the short financier blinked, momentarily taken more than a bit aback by the honest bewilderment expressed in those questions. Nevertheless, the duck's eyes behind the pince-nez perched on top of his bright orange bill then narrowed in suspicion at this being some sort of trick, growling at his prisoner in a clipped Scots accent the answers to those inquiries:

"I'm Scrooge McDuck, and you're trespassing in my money bin!"


	14. Chapter 14

Early on in its career, when a certain entity glumly contemplated its future as far as it could see in being forced to serve various evil wizards, psychotic witches, senile sorcerers, and other irrational magic-wielders, every one of them who couldn't locate their sanity if handed a GPS device and a copy of every map in the Library of Congress, it soon came to a simple conclusion:

When you were a Magic Mirror, you had to take your fun where you could find it.

Over the centuries of its existence, it had developed enduring patience, which helped a great deal in waiting for just the perfect moment. Which was….now!

"OH MOST RADIANT OF MISTRESSES, THIS HUMBLE SERVANT HAS NEWS FOR THEE!"

From the oval mirror in an ornate frame mounted on the wall of the witch's chambers, a sonorous voice rumbled at ear-deafening levels, causing various events to happen.

The overpowering noise rattled entire shelves filled with multi-colored potions in their glass phials.

By sheer volume, a nearby dozing raven was blasted off its perch on top of someone's skull resting on a table, making the bird desperately flutter its wings as it struggled to stay in flight and not come crashing down onto the floor, with the evil familiar angrily opening and closing its beak in what would have been heard as irate screeching caws over being disturbed, except nobody could have listened to its complaints over the overwhelming din.

Lastly, the racket disturbed the intent figure leaning over a bubbling cauldron, causing their hands to jerk in surprise while they were in the process of painstakingly scraping an infinitesimal fragment off a small block of an extremely dangerous magical substance held above the roiling surface of the toxic liquid. Hopelessly startled, this person now dropped the entire lethal concoction into the cauldron, to their absolute horror.

The resulting explosion was most impressive.

Later, when the Magic Mirror lovingly went through its memories in slow motion, it watched in absolute glee as the erupting cauldron, blasting off on a comet-trail of sparks and streaks of fire, leapt straight up in the air almost all the way to the ceiling. Just before its collusion, the cauldron then violently burst apart, sending bits of the metal pot flying everywhere, with associated damage to every object inside the room. Including a certain familiar, as one such piece of shrapnel managed a direct hit on the raven flying around the chamber, causing the bird to abruptly depart from this life in a cloud of feathers that was as black as the smoke now filling the entire room.

Actually, the metal fragments zipping throughout the air were the least of the problems for the remaining pair of beings inside the room. Knowing its serious protections laid on it would keep the supernatural construct from any harm, the Magic Mirror cheerfully ignored the pings! of various pieces of the cauldron hitting the surface of the engrossed reflective panel, and instead, it happily watched as the person directly under the ruptured cauldron spraying its released contents everywhere desperately tried to dodge the near-boiling liquid.

Spluttering howls of distress that yelped throughout the room indicated the clear failure of this action, as to the Magic Mirror's intense disappointment, the explosion-created smoke that was now engulfing the entire room hid how several gallons of concentrated Blistering Lava Sludge was directly dumped onto someone.

If the Magic Mirror actually had a physical body, it would now have been rolling around the floor in absolute mirth, clutching its (metaphorical) ribs while sadistically enjoying how its mistress was having a really bad day.

Just barely managing to stifle its giggling, the mirror's mood perked up at seeing how the smoke in the room was now beginning to dissipate, and it cleared up after a few moments, revealing its detested owner in her full glory.

Magica De Spell, the most powerful witch in Italy, stood in her wrecked chambers, her voluptuous duck body shaking with pure wrath, her usual sleek and stylish black dress now covered with numerous smoldering plague-green blotches from the cauldron's nasty brew, her flowing midnight-black locks now frazzled and scorched, and her normal heavy eye-shadow washed off in streaks covering her orange bill and all of her lower face.

The witch's eyes were now also narrowed to the merest slits, showing through this a gleam of pure red that matched the angry scarlet sparks popping from the tip of her drawn wand, with both the homicidal glare and the pointed wand directed straight at the Magic Mirror.

This reflective panel prudently kept quiet as Magica began stalking towards it, composedly watching as the witch kicked out of her way the corpse of her former pet Ratface the raven. Even if she hadn't been in the midst of a towering rage, Magica wouldn't have cared the slightest about the death of her familiar. Another bird would do just as well, right after she had words with that….that….THING!

Stopping right before the mirror, and drawing a deep breath for a wild scream into her reflection, Magica was interrupted at the very last possible second by another sonorous blast from the mirror that sent the singed hair of her wig streaming straight back.

"FAIREST OF THEM ALL, THY ANCIENT ENEMY HATH THE STRANGEST VISITOR--"

Now totally infuriated, the sorceress performed a sweep of her wand that sent a blast of magical energy right at the mirror, burning a diagonal streak inches deep into the very stones of the wall holding the mirror, as Magica shrieked even louder than the mirror, "SILENCE!"

The Magic Mirror promptly shut up, which was the only thing resulting from Magica's actions. While her attack with her wand had damaged the wall at the sides of the mirror, this object itself was totally unharmed, as the energy striking it had dissipated right after the sorceress had sent it in her rage that had made Magica forget her possession had serious protections shielding it, plus the duck also risked serious misfortune if she'd actually managed to break or shatter it.

Destroy a Magic Mirror, and seven years' bad luck would be the least of her troubles.

Magica's furious mood lessened a bit as she remembered this, and she was also distracted from her temper tantrum at suddenly remembering what exactly the mirror had just said. Glaring at her angry reflection, Magica demanded, "What, you mean Scrooge McDuck? What visitor? What are you talking about?"

Not a single word was uttered by the Magic Mirror.

Magica's eyes bulged, as her blood pressure soared to extreme levels, and as she gritted her teeth, the witch snarled, "You can speak now! More quietly, you hear, you talking glass?!"

Waiting for a few seconds as the Magic Mirror contemplated for the dozenth time how exactly the duck's teeth could appear out of thin air, plus also to increase the chances of his owner actually having a stroke, the magical object which for centuries had learned to find the loopholes and the letter of the law in obeying its disliked orders and commands, now said in an equally snotty tone, if with lower volume, "A mage of great power hath appeared in that elderly avian's place of wealth."

"WHAT?!" shrieked Magica in disbelief, who then demanded, "Show me!"

Looking at the surface of the mirror, the now-worried witch watched as her reflection shimmered, and then vanished as another picture formed on the mirror, that of an overhead view of Scrooge McDuck's money bin. Magica's bill dropped open in utter amazement as her sorcerous senses saw what was now covering that entire building. It would have been invisible to any non-magical being, but the witch was now staring at a dome of pure magical energy arcing over the money bin. Right now, Magica uneasily doubted that with all her own power she would have been capable of creating this incredible dome.

Sputtering in shock, Magica ordered, "Show me more! Let me look inside the money bin!"

"Thou knowest this lowly servant may not carry out thy command, oh glorious flower of womanhood, and why this is so," said the Magic Mirror, totally enjoying the glare sent its way for both its archaic speech with the added fulsome compliments. Not to mention that Magica uncomfortably knew exactly why the mirror couldn't peer inside the money bin.

As an unsettled look came over Magica's features, and she began to pace back and forth before the mirror, her possession watched the witch in bubbling delight that was only heightened by the mirror's inward smirking over the fact that it could have provided more information in the clearer vernacular of the present day, and it could still do so, if only Magica De Spell would do one simple thing:

Be polite.

Since the Magic Mirror considered the extremely remote chances of this taking place to be equal to the witch suddenly deciding to join a convent and then being voted "Most Pleasant Nun" by the other members of the women's religious community, it patiently waited for the next order that was sure to come.

"Show me the outside of the money bin over the last few minutes! I want to see this mage when they entered that building!"

The Magic Mirror was about to answer, when its attention was caught by a thin trail of smoke coming over Magica's left shoulder. After a moment of puzzlement at seeing this, the mirror decided to ignore this distraction, to then answer the impatient witch with something that could only increase her anxiety.

"Alas, thy will may not be done, thou magnificent mistress. The mage appeared, from where I know not, directly inside the place of thy concern."

"Ahh….ahh….," choked out Magica, her expression totally thunderstruck, until she finally said something more coherent. "That's impossible! Not even I can do that anymore! And…there has to be only one reason for that mage to do that!"

Since that wasn't a direct question or command, the Magic Mirror refrained from saying anything more for now, just content at seeing the varied emotions of worry, fear, doubt, rage and others chase themselves over Magica's face. When at last her features firmed in the clear signs of a decision finally being made, and the duck shifted to begin a turn to go around in her business, the mirror, with exquisite timing, slipped in the knife.

"My lady, she who hath control of the mightiest powers of the air and--"

"WHAT?!" shouted Magica.

With a now clearly-offended tone, the Magic Mirror murmured, "As one who hath sworn to obey and protect, prithee, this humble servant must point out, as thee surely hath already considered, that mage now with thy adversary may not have come to take what is truly yours. Nay, one of such power -- though it surely doth not compare to thy own -- may have been summoned by Scrooge McDuck to help him guard and defend the prize that all wish to possess."

The Magical Mirror had never before seen a duck about to faint.

After a few moments on her unsteady feet, Magica De Spell, who'd clearly never considered this, dazedly shook her head, and showed signs of a rapid recovery from this horrible suggestion by her growing irritation, as she growled at the mirror. "We'll see about that, when I get there! Now, listen--" The duck pointed her wand at the mirror, and snappishly continued, "--I want you to keep a close eye around all that place. Warn me at once if that mage leaves the money bin or does anything else that you can learn about! Understand?"

Deadpan, the Magic Mirror answered, "I live but to serve."

"That's the way things should be," snorted the duck. As Magica De Spell turned to stalk off towards the center of the room, her back now to the reflective panel, the Magic Mirror began to speak, and then it thought better, instead watching with silent fascination as the very tip of Magica's tail feathers stopped smoldering, and burst into a tiny flame.

Unconscious of this, the sorceress stopped in the middle of the spell circle, and she gracefully waved her wand in starting the casting that would transport her to the location she wished to go, and Magica now spoke the name of that specific place.

"Duckburg---YEOW!!"

In a puff of mystical smoke, the female duck disappeared in the middle of an agonized shriek and a frantic swat at her posterior.

In the now-empty room, the mirror started whooping with laughter, as it hadn't done since the Middle Ages.


	15. Chapter 15

Harry Potter never before seen a duck in a kilt.

Particularly one posing in an old master-style painting currently hanging from the office wall, all while the aged drake shown in the artwork was dressed in full Highland fig and glaring out from under a tartan tam-o'-shanter tugged down to nearly eyebrow level and past massive side-whiskers, bestowing upon everyone gazing at his portrait a truly dyspeptic glower that suggested the artist had started his work at the exact moment his subject had just remembered that earlier today he'd been forced to provide a Sassenach with a free meal.

It was clearly a family portrait, as the features of the elderly Scots duck in the portrait on the wall directly at the rear of the massive desk in the room had an absolutely uncanny resemblance towards the other mature drake sitting behind this piece of furniture. Down to sharing the exact look of "--and what the blazes do YOU want?!"

Considering that Scrooge McDuck was also grimly resting his index finger onto Harry's wand that was laying on top of the desk, the wizard was more than glad enough to avert his gaze from both relentless stares of those members of the McDuck family. Though, when Harry glanced at the mirror on the office side wall and glumly eyed his reflection, the Briton wasn't all that sanguine about his chances of getting through his current situation with no further difficulties.

After all, having to wear an immense metal hat of some kind that looked exactly like an upside-down birdbath studded with numerous metallic protrusions and excrescences which were now producing extremely bizarre noises would make anyone uneasy. In an attempt to divert his anxiety over his circumstances, Harry decided to catalogue the sounds being made by….whatever he was wearing. And from elsewhere in the office.

//Bloop, bloop// That seemed to be coming from the small dish antenna merrily spinning around its axis of the tiny rod protruding from the front of the hat.

//Wheeze, glonk, wheeze, glonk// A short cylinder with white fabric sides and thin steel bracing was rhythmically lifting itself up several inches from the surface of the left side of the hat, and when it reached its full height, it promptly dropped back down into the hat, all while making those rather unsettling sounds.

//Ting, ting, ting// A rather charming bell was softly ringing in time with the row of flashing lights on the right façade of the hat, blinking in colors of red and blue and….mauve?

//Bzz, bzz, bzz// Well, at least that wasn't being produced by the hat. Still, Harry's mood wasn't all that improved by recognizing this, considering the strange metal manikin that was now perched on his right knee and cheerfully swinging its legs, all while the foot-tall tiny robot (Harry had spent enough time in the muggle world to identify this machine for what it was) intently studied the man it was using as a chair, even as it made those thoughtful buzzing sounds from the top of its body. Harry still refused to call that specific part of its body a head, since the wizard was quite sure that craniums weren't supposed to consist of a glowing yellow light bulb.

"Most interesting….fascinating….truly remarkable…." At least this new bloke was wearing trousers, as he paced back and forth across Harry, his eyes bright behind his pince-nez as that individual now keenly scrutinized the wizard, happily muttering to himself. Both a younger and a much taller person than Scrooge McDuck, dressed in brown shoes and pants, a white long-sleeved shirt that had a black vest over it, topped off by an absurd, tiny, round hat with a strap holding it in place onto a bushy brown hairstyle that resembled nothing more than a bird's nest. This latest observer also shared with the financier that had detained Harry the physical characteristics of white feathers over all his body and an actual avian beak (though this specific body part was much more pointed than that bill possessed by the older non-human).

All in all, Harry was feeling a little guilty and trying hard not to think of yesterday's lunch that had consisted of a bottle of butterbeer, crisps, and a nice chicken sandwich, with mayo.

"So, Gyro, have you come to any conclusions yet?" Still keeping his suspicious gaze upon Harry, Scrooge McDuck addressed that inquiry to the only other person in the office that the financier actually trusted at this specific moment.

"Mmm?" Absently delivering that distracted comment while now thoughtfully rubbing his chin (um, the underside of his beak) with a four-fingered hand, Gyro Gearloose blinked behind his glasses, and glanced over at his current employer now giving him an exasperated look. Belatedly thinking over what he'd just been asked, Gyro cleared his throat, and shook his head. "I still need to study the data, which should be produced any moment--"

To Harry's alarm, the hat began to shudder against his skull. As he clapped his hands against the sides of his headgear to make it stop shaking, the wizard became even more nervous at hearing an accompanying deep whirr coming from directly above the top of his cranium. This sound abruptly cut off, making Harry even more concerned, until something suddenly happened, easily seen by the last of the Potter family, as the man's eyes darted again to the mirror and witnessed what next occurred.

//SPROING!// From a lengthwise slot in the center of the metal hat, a brown square of some unknown substance launched itself nearly all the way to the ceiling. Still watching the mirror, a dumbfounded Harry saw this object reach its peak, and then it started to descend. His attention was diverted from this by the sudden appearance of a nozzle abruptly protruding from the surface of the hat, while at the same time the dish antenna stopped revolving, to instead pointing itself with absolute accuracy at the falling object.

//Sploot!// A clump of yellowish goop was spat from the nozzle, with this sticky mess flying through the air to unerringly splatter against the near face of the dropping four-sided figure, covering every square inch of this. Harry's eyes now shifted from the mirror to watching as this object now came into his field of vision, as it fell towards the floor in front of him, only to be interrupted in its journey.

With casual skill, Gyro Gearloose shot out his flattened hand at blinding speed, stopping only an inch from Harry's nose, and allowing him to watch at close range as the object dropped right into the non-human's palm. At this point, Harry was at last able to identify exactly this strange object.

A perfectly-toasted bread slice now gleaming with a lavish surface of melted butter now rested in Gyro's hand.

An instant later, as the inventor/scientist lifted his snack to his mouth, a clattering came from the bizarre device a dazed Harry was wearing, as from a small slot in the left edge of Gyro's invention, a long ribbon of paper was quickly extruded. Munching away, the anthropomorphic chicken reached out to tear away the ribbon with his other hand, and then the inventor examined what was printed on this, nodding with satisfaction as he read the given data.

Becoming impatient when Gyro remained engrossed with the results, Scrooge McDuck rasped, "Well?"

Hastily swallowing his mouthful of toast, the other Duckburg native told his employer, "My combination lie-detector/toaster shows that he's told the complete and absolute truth."

Harry's mouth fell open at hearing the beginning of that statement. About to ask why the hell anyone would want to build such a ridiculous invention, the wizard's gaze fell to the small robot still roosting on the man's knee and without a doubt having its attention directed at Harry. This intelligent machine now slowly revolved its light bulb in a complete circle, clearly the closest it could get to a warning headshake against asking that specific question.

* * *

Several minutes later, Harry was rather uncertainly holding his wand, and he unthinkingly gave this magical stick the merest flick, producing several small red sparks, the wizarding world's equivalent of clicking on a flashlight switch to make sure it was working.

"Most interesting!" happily exclaimed Gyro, as he bent down to peer at the stick in Harry's hand. The wizard had a slight flush rise in his cheeks at being caught playing with his wand, and he quickly returned his weapon to his arm holster. Only then did Harry glance at the patiently waiting chicken (and wasn't this just totally blooming weird, having to think of that?), with the human clearing his throat to hopefully ask, "Are you sure you can get me back to my home dimension?"

Shrugging, Gyro waved encouragingly down the broad stone stairs of the front entrance of the money bin, and the avian started walking down these, as he confided, "It's still too soon to say, Harry. I'll need to thoroughly examine you in my laboratory first, as I said before."

As he followed at Gyro's side, Harry sighed with depression, and then hastily apologized, "Sorry, er, Gyro. I understand that it'll take time, and I really want to thank you for offering to let me stay with you. At least, you've been more sympathetic and considerate than someone else." The wizard's features now changed into a dark glower, as he twisted his neck to glare over his shoulder at the looming structure that held the vast wealth of a certain financier who had just escorted the pair at this moment walking down the stairs to the front door of the building, cautiously handed Harry's wand back once that man had stepped outside, and then had rudely slammed the door shut into their faces.

A faint chuckle came from the tall inventor, as he told Harry, "Mr. McDuck is rather paranoid, isn't he? Though, I must say that he has really good cause for that, with the Beagle Boys and all the others who want to steal his money and other valuable objects. It must have been an immense shock to him at discovering you right inside his money bin."

Harry scowled into the distance ahead as the duo stepped onto the sidewalk in front of the building to head down this walkway, and then he grumbled, "What's it with me and banks, anyway? All I wanted to do was to look inside my family vault, and then I got sent to here, wherever that is."

Gyro thoughtfully said, "By portkey, as you said?" At Harry's nod, the inventor mused, "Well, I'll have to start my investigations with that dimensional transporter. Ah, I would also like to learn more about your world and your magic, as long as you're here."

Harry gave a quick glance out of the corner of his eye towards the introspective being walking at his side, and admitted, "Well, the Statute of Secrecy doesn't seem to apply here and now. Not that I wouldn't mind all that much if an Auror showed up to arrest me over having broken that, since it'd mean I'd be able to get home, even with all the trouble that'd cause. You do seem to be pretty much comfortable at accepting the concept of magic, for someone who's such a mu--, er, non-magical person."

"Oh, I've had experience with magic before, Harry, just as Mr. McDuck does. I'm just more interested in science and technology, since they seem to work better for me." As they strolled along together towards a small park, Gyro went on, as a fascinated young man listened. "Frankly, in all cases, it just seems to be an attempt to harness the forces of the universe. Consider magnetism, radioactivity, and electricity. A thousand years ago, any successful control of those energies would have been considered nothing but magic by the populace at large."

Grinning, Harry confided, "I know someone who would really love to talk to you. She once quoted to me a line, 'Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.' Then, Hermione said, 'Any sufficiently advanced magic is indistinguishable from technology.'"

Gyro Gearloose actually cackled, as there was no other word that more perfectly described that noise coming from his beak. As they entered the park, the inventor beamed at his young visitor, "We're going to have a most enjoyable time together, Harry!"

Now in a much better mood, Harry Potter had an accepting smile appear on his face, as the pair passed a clump of bushes. This smile was still on his features when a black beam of light abruptly blazed from this shrubbery, hitting Harry right in the back of his head.

As the wizard collapsed to the ground, he had time for one last thought before everything went dark.

*If this is death, Mad-Eye is going to spend the rest of eternity shouting into my face, 'CONSTANT VIGILANCE!'*


	16. Chapter 16

Alive. Check.

Lying doggo until you suss things out. Check.

Feeling numerous feminine hands caressing your nude body in the enormous bed holding yourself and your entire harem consisting of the prettiest sixteen-year-old girls from Hogwarts, Beauxbatons, and Durmstrang. Don't check.

Dammit, considering his entire existence, he deserved for once waking up to something like that, instead of what he was experiencing right this minute!

Warily cracking apart his right eye in a fractional slit, Harry Potter balefully regarded his surroundings for a few moments, only then fully opening both eyes to assess the entire cocked-up situation.

Well, he seemed to be upside down, dangling from a rope tied to his ankles that went up to the roof beams of the deserted, grimy factory room he was currently occupying, about six feet off the floor, in some kind of body-binding hex holding his arms and hands firmly pressed against his torso and unable to move, and to top it all off, he positively had to go to the loo. Story of his life, really, which was incredibly depressing when you actually thought about it.

Harry slowly closed his eyes in absolute exasperation. What was the whole BLOODY point?! Yes, yes, the wizard understood all about the reasons for demonstrating he was totally in the power of whoever was keeping him prisoner. But, why couldn't any soddin' Dark Lord just do it while letting Harry coming around to consciousness in a nice, soft feather bed, and then sympathetically offering him a good cuppa?

*If that ever actually happens, and the first words out of the So-Called Conqueror of the World's mouth are, "First, we kill all the lawyers," I'm going to give serious consideration to joining up. Especially if his minions' outfits are in fact stylish and comfortable.*

Harry's sardonic mood abruptly ended when he opened his eyes again and craned his head around to further check out his situation. *SHITE!* The wizard worriedly stared at Gyro Gearloose also trussed up by his ankles and dangling from another rope, in another restraining hex and still unconscious, a few yards away from the young man.

A wave of anger washed over Harry's mind at seeing another innocent being brought into his troubles. Twisting in his magical bonds, the Englishman spent several moments testing whether he could break out of these by his muscles alone, only to finally admit failure. However, Harry learned a more startling piece of information.

He still had his wand.

Harry could feel this magical weapon still inside his arm holster, and without thinking, the wizard opened his mouth to begin the command of "Accio wand!" Just in time, he stopped short of what might have been a disaster. Instead, he once again tried and failed to move his restrained fingers inside the binding hex, and admitted to himself that it wouldn't have been wise to have spelled his wand from his holster to his right hand, when that part of his body couldn't have grabbed it. The wand would have probably just fallen to the floor and possibly broken.

So, what now? Contemplating that, Harry was momentarily distracted while wondering that his captor(s) probably knew about wizards and wands, why hadn't his weapon been taken from him? Mmm, maybe they thought some kind of protective spell or other magical booby-trap had been laid onto his wand? That seemed as good as any other answer at this moment. Well, time to come up with something else, and Harry could think of only one thing. Wandless magic.

It had been literally years since he'd done it, the casting of his personal power by will alone. Still, since he'd once caused an entire zoo exhibit window to completely vanish, if he could do that on his bonds, both magical and mundane, that would be just what was needed. Ignoring the fact that he was slowly revolving at the end of the rope due to his recent struggles, Harry started concentrating. However, after a few moments, something extremely surprising caused the young wizard end his attempt, to instead stare open-mouthed in astonishment at what was taking place a few feet away.

On the limp body of Gyro dangling from his rope, something unknown was moving inside his front shirt pocket. Blinking at this, Harry watched with fascination as a yellow object poked itself out of the top of the pocket. The wizard immediately recognized this as the head, top, whatever, of Gyro's little robot. Harry had totally forgotten that this machine had been placed inside his shirt by the inventor when he and Harry had taken their leave of Scrooge McDuck. Frantically, the young man tried to remember what Gyro had called his contraption.

"Oi! Pssst! Uh….Helper! Yes, you! Over here!" called out Harry, glad to have dredged up that little machine's name.

Pulling itself out of Gyro's pocket while clinging with its upper manipulators to his master's shirt due to also being upside down, Helper spun its light-bulb head to clearly regard Harry. A moment later, its right arm came loose to wave at the wizard.

An unexpected snort of laughter came from the Briton, who then saw Helper turn its body around, to swarm up Gyro's torso at where the first of the bands of the binding hex were holding the inventor's arms against his sides. Harry watched Helper poke the invisible restraint, its head cocked to the side as it clearly studied what was evidently constraining its master, and then it obviously came to a decision. An enthralled Harry witnessed Helper holding away its right arm, as the end of that limb transmuted, with the tiny fingers merging and shifting into a new form, that of a small circular buzz-saw blade.

In the next instant, Helper caused this tool to rapidly spin, and then the little robot placed this contrivance against the binding hex, producing a trail of minuscule sparks and a thin whine that made Harry wince and hastily look around to see if that had attracted anyone's notice. Bringing back his attention to the others, Harry saw Helper take away his saw from the unaffected binding hex, and stare at his dulled saw blade with actual astonishment.

Shaking his head, Harry opened his mouth at the same time Helper looked up thoughtfully at the rope around Gyro's ankles. This made the wizard screech his next words a little, "NO! If you cut the rope and he falls to the floor, he'll get hurt!" Still holding onto Gyro, Helper swiveled his light-bulb cranium around to regard Harry, who was himself jerking his head in a come-here gesture. Speaking more softly, Harry coaxed, "Look, if you can get down and then climb onto me, I think I know a way to get loose, for both of us."

Helper was immobile for a moment, continuing to examine Harry, until the robot began sliding down Gyro's body, to itself dangle by one hand from that inventor's absurd hat, and finally letting go to drop without harm to the floor. Scurrying over to standing directly under Harry, Helper looked up at the wizard peering down at the machine. Right after that, soft whirring sounds came from the robot, as its metal legs began to extend so that it soon became twice as tall as before. Helper then flexed its knees, and then bounced straight up, its arms thrusting forward towards Harry's head.

Despite himself, the wizard flinched, and by the time he recovered, Helper had carefully sunk its claws in the cloth of the man's robe at his shoulders, and using this grip, the robot swarmed up Harry's body, to reach the human's chest and turn itself around so that it was also upside down as it stared right into Harry's face, nose to….front of the glass bulb.

Harry had to cross his eyes a bit to clearly examine the small machine gazing at him. The flickering yellow glow of the robot's upper body made the man abruptly recollect something else that had looked at him with golden eyes. Hedwig, his pet owl that had been with him for virtually all his time at Hogwarts had that same steady stare of total trust and loyalty towards her master that was clearly shared by Helper towards Gyro Gearloose. His throat closing in remembered pain of that companion's death, Harry husked, "I promise I'll set him free and protect him, Helper."

The little machine stood immobile for a moment, and then it bobbed forward once, in an actual nod of understanding. Then, the robot drew back, to stay steady as it awaited Harry's orders. Jerking his chin at his right arm, the wizard directed, "Can you cut through my shirtsleeve? Once you do that, there'll be a leather holster. You'll have to cut through the top of that, too, since there's no room to take out the stick inside through the bottom, past the binding hex. Be VERY careful not to damage that stick."

Again bobbing its head in acceptance, Helper shifted over to Harry's right arm, and using its claws that were transmuted to scissor blades, quickly snipped through the cloth of the shirtsleeve and also the leather below. Prying open the small hole at the top, Helper showed Harry the back end of his wand. Nodding with satisfaction, the wizard again ordered the machine, "All right, pull out that wand -- DON'T damage it! -- all the way out, and hold it. Once I tell you what to do, you need to get off me and go back to Gyro."

Helper efficiently pulled the wand free, and holding the foot-long stick in his arms, it regarded Harry in anticipation of further commands. The man himself was looking a little sheepish, grimacing at what he next had to do. Sighing, Harry gave his final order.

"Stick the end of the wand into my mouth."

A few moments later, a grunt and a wave of the wand was made when Harry swept his head, causing Helper to duck under the flailing stick firmly clenched in the man's teeth. A louder grunt and the wizard's eyebrows lowered in a fierce, unspoken command made the little robot actually perform an accepting shrug, and then Helper lowered itself down Harry's chest to drop off his dangling body, with the inventor's companion scurrying back over to take its place under Gyro Gearloose. As an upside-down young man craned his neck to make a last check on the automaton, he saw Helper fold its arms across its che-- front part of its body, corrected Harry to himself, and then stand there waiting expectantly.

*I'm SO glad nobody else is going to see this,* glumly thought Harry, who was now about to do something that the entire British wizarding world considered absolutely indecorous, rude, ill-mannered, and any other possible description of an action considered totally boorish. Attempting to use his wand with his mouth.

One reason why the pureblood held the muggle-born in utter contempt was something that happened every single time those new witches and wizards from non-magical families received their wands (from Ollivander's, of course) and then carried these accessories away. While the wands were in the possession of the inexperienced mages, SOME boy or girl always came up with the bright idea of inserting these sticks of wood into their mouths and using their lips, teeth, and tongues to wave the wands around in a mock attempt at casting spells.

If they were lucky, those innocent children did this for the first time only in front of their new friends in the wizarding world their own ages, who, usually in the middle of disgusted snickering, promptly told those with their wands sticking out from their faces that they'd just performed the equivalent of picking their noses in public. And just like that other specific cultural taboo, it was something that was just NOT done among other witches and wizards, without risking discovery and humiliation, as the children of magical families were told right from the moment they could understand this, much less before they were given their own wand.

Actually, there were indeed good, clear reasons for wand-wielders to refrain from that action. First, wands just weren't designed to be placed inside the mouth, and doing this risked damage to those items from teeth and saliva. However, there was an even more important reason. Nine hundred and ninety-nine times out of a thousand, nothing would happen in the first place to anybody doing just that with their wand.

The thousandth time somebody stuck their wand in their mouth and wiggled that magical object, it was entirely possible for a totally random spell to be cast by the wand, just a foot away from those idiots' faces. In wizarding Britain, every child knew the legend of "No-Nose Ned", the naughty little wizard who had to go through the rest of his life looking like that just because he didn't listen to his mum and dad and keep his wand in his hand like a proper pureblood should.

At this moment, with his mouth full of a magical weapon that could easily blow a hole the size of a watermelon through a yard-thick stone wall, Harry Potter really wished that Ron Weasley hadn't had so much glee in his voice while telling that story to every muggle-born student during their first night together in the Gryffindor common room.


	17. Chapter 17

Magica de Spell did a last check of her lipstick and hair with her compact mirror, only then snapping shut the small, flat, circular makeup box with a crisp 'click!' sound, to put this golden container away in her dress pocket. After doing this, the avian witch just stood there in the gloomy room of the shut-down factory, with what light that came through the broken windows high up on the grimy walls shining upon the very thoughtful face of that female duck.

So far, things had gone well, much better than she'd hoped for. The ambush and stunning of the wizard she'd been stalking had been absolutely successful, though his companion had been an unforeseen complication. Still, her magic had then easily spirited herself and those two unconscious beings into this deserted factory, where she'd further used her powers to bind and suspend her pair of prisoners. Hopefully, once the human that truly concerned Magica regained his awareness, he'd be disconcerted enough to reveal the purpose of his presence.

In short, was that wizard here in Duckburg, not to mention right inside Scrooge McDuck's money bin, due to….IT? Was he trying to steal IT? Or IT's powers? Much more disturbing, had Scrooge brought him here to help safeguard and protect IT?

A vicious snarl passed over Magica's features at that last disquieting thought, until she firmly managed to get herself once more under control, to again show the world her normal prideful look of contempt for all those people less than the dust under the witch's webbed feet. The duck managed to keep her icy glower upon her features, even with the sudden unsettling twinge that now passed through her entire body, a shudder caused by being reminded of the simple fact that human hanging from his ankles in the other room was certainly not in any way weak or powerless, despite his current comatose condition.

Once she'd started investigating with her mystical abilities, Magica had been staggered by the sheer force of the magic pouring off from that human. The witch hadn't dared to cast any spells to read his mind or make him obey her, actions she'd successfully performed many times before. The wizard had some of the strongest mental defenses she'd ever come across, and Magica was also extremely unnerved by the possibility that mage might have the capability to moreover use his mind to both protect himself and attack anyone who tried to breach the privacies of his psyche.

Her worries had only increased when she'd checked out as carefully as possible the wand that wizard was carrying. Despite instantly coveting this rod of immense power, at this point, Magica couldn't think of any practical way to successfully separate the wand from its owner without setting off whatever protection and anti-thief spells that must surely have been laid upon the wand. Not without the nearly certain possibility of destroying that magical stick, which would defeat the whole purpose, anyway. Of course, if that wizard had the courtesy of suddenly departing from this life, his wand would unquestionably belong to whomever had the opportunity to promptly claim it….

A very cold smile momentarily appeared on Magica's features, as she contemplated her last thought. Still, however delightful that prospect was, at this moment, she was resigned to what she'd reluctantly decided to carry out some time ago, when she'd used her magic to suspend those captives upside down from their attached ropes, and putting that wizard in the strongest body-bind hex she'd ever cast. Since that wasn't a direct attack either upon the mage or his wand, any automatic defense spells would fail to activate, and when that human finally woke up, he'd understand who was really in charge here.

Smirking, Magica drew her own wand, and she then made some calculations in her mind. Given the amount of power she'd used in her stunning spell, if that human was like any other, he'd be awakening in the next minute or so. Now, what would be the most alarming thing for her prisoner, to regain consciousness and then seeing her right there, pointing her wand directly between his eyes, or waking up and finding himself in someone's power without knowing who, until she made her majestic entrance, as benefiting a sorceress supreme?

*Ah, decisions, decisions….* lovingly contemplated Magica for several moments, until the merest horizontal wrinkle abruptly appeared on her brow above her plucked eyebrows. (Um. Eyefeathers? Well, whatever she had, you can be quite sure she plucked them.) The witch had just frowningly recollected a minor, but somewhat annoying, detail that had been trying to get her attention for the last minute or so. Viz, one Gyro Gearloose.

Magica hadn't really wanted to also capture that inventor during her attack upon the wizard, but she could hardly leave behind any witnesses to her kidnapping of his companion. So, she'd irritably stunned him and brought that insensible Duckburg citizen along to this factory, to then hang him by the wizard, dangling on his own rope, out of, perhaps, a vague sense of tidiness. The witch hadn't bothered to cast any other spells upon Gyro, since that person mattered nothing at all to her.

An ugly light began to slowly appear in Magica's eyes. An irritation, yes, that perfectly described Gyro Gearloose, both right this second and also how he'd acted in the past then during his previous encounters with the witch. Despite having no magic at all, he'd managed to outthink and use his inventions to defeat her, either on his own or in helping out Scrooge McDuck. And now, that extremely intelligent individual was totally in her power, along with the wizard who'd been with him, both clearly enjoying each other's company when she watched them earlier today.

Red sparks started leaping off the tip of Magica's wand in response to her current furious state of mind, as the witch's wrath rose, along with her sudden evil glee of knowing she'd soon get exactly what she wanted. *That wizard might be stubborn, but let's see what happens when I threaten Gyro. Especially when I indeed carry out my threats, which shall be most….imaginative.*

Magica de Spell now strutted towards and through the doorway into the room containing her prisoners, eager to show them both all the power a true sorceress possessed. Yet, once there, the witch suddenly stopped short, to thrust forward her wand, all while screaming at the top of her lungs, "YOU LITTLE BEAST!"

Harry Potter, on his fourteenth try in attempting to banish his mystical bindings, and like all the previous thirteen attempts, having absolutely no luck, snapped back his head, to look upside-down across the room at a truly enraged duck in a very tight black dress which undeniably revealed that whatever this being's species was, she was without question a female. Harry managed to think all that in the instant it took for the miniature lightning bolt to zip from the tip of this duck's wand, to where Helper had frantically leapt upwards, just before a small crater was blasted in the floor right where the little robot had formerly been patiently standing.

Both concrete dust and debris still hung in the air when Helper came down from his hop, for him to then scurry across the factory floor, his metal legs blurring in their speedy strides that carried him in a flash towards, behind, and past rusting pieces of former factory machinery, all which exploded, disintegrated, melted, froze solid, or were otherwise destroyed, all to the accompaniment of various shrieked Italian obscenities.

At least, that's what Harry thought the duck was yelling. She might have just been congratulating herself over how close she was getting at hitting Helper with her spells, as that metal mannikin continued exposing himself, running around the floor away from Harry and Gyro dangling from their ropes. His wand still clenched in his teeth, the man now snarled to himself under his breath, as he suddenly realized that loyal machine was willingly drawing away that witch's attention and spell casting, giving Harry precious time for another chance to free himself.

Twisting his head back in a savage jerk, Harry glared up at his torso where his arms were still tightly restrained against the sides of his body by the witch's hex. The wizard now ignored the wand he was still gripping between his teeth, while he then simply concentrated with all his power upon the source of his magic, the very inner core of his being, and Harry mentally ordered as strongly as he could, *VANISH!*

Once more, the innate magic of the son of James and Lily Potter obeyed his desire. Though, perhaps, not exactly his intention.

Harry's rather idiosyncratic counterspell abruptly popped into existence at skin level above his navel, and easily cancelled out the right half of the body-binding hex during its rapid diagonal ascent towards the left side of his body. This meant his right arm was successfully freed, which if that spell had only stopped right there in its path, this would have been perfectly fine with Harry. Unfortunately, he'd overdone it. Again.

The spell left in existence the hex on his left side, holding that arm still restrained, to instead continue soaring upwards in its rise as it effortlessly dissolved the bottom parts of his robe and shirt, his belt, his pants, his Y-fronts, his socks, his shoes, the rope around his ankles all the way up to where it had been tied around a roof beam, said roof beam, and a twenty-foot wide portion of the factory ceiling. Fortunately, there hadn't been any airplanes directly above the building at that exact moment, though a small, white, fluffy cloud just minding its own business at an altitude several thousand feet higher promptly became extinct.

Even if he WAS now flashing the entire world, Harry had several other things competing for his attention at the precise moment. At least having some of the fastest reflexes ever seen on the Quidditch pitch once again came to the man's aid, as a descending Harry hastily yanked from his mouth his wand, waved this in front of himself while shouting "Protego!", and still managed to twist and curl his body so that when he landed on the hard floor, it was the wizard's left shoulder that hit first, instead of his more fragile head.

Not that this managed to completely save Harry from injury, as he now actually felt something go 'crunch!' deep inside his shoulder while an explosion of white-hot agony burst inside his brain. Still, pain and Harry Potter were old acquaintances, so he mentally shoved away his hurts as he successfully completed his forward roll without passing out, to then spin around while arising onto his feet, all with a certain part of his anatomy merrily bouncing along in accompaniment with every physical exertion.

Despite everything, Harry managed to concentrate on what was most important, as a large bolt of lightning promptly blasted against the face of his magical shield he was now sheltering behind. A practiced duelist's eyes examined the shield, and satisfied it would stay intact another few seconds, Harry then flicked his wand towards an insensible Gyro still attached to his own rope and totally unaware of the conflict between the pair of mages, as the wizard snapped "Protego!" again, covering the inventor in his own protective shield in case Harry's opponent tried to distract him by launching an attack at her helpless prisoner.

Actually, Magica de Spell was more distracted by her adversary than anyone else, as she launched several more scorching lightning bolts at Harry, all while again screaming at the top of her lungs, "Bastardo! I will turn you into a castrato for this, you vile and disgusting creature! How dare you expose yourself to a noblewoman, you stupidaggine! You have no honor! You do not deserve the First Dime, as I do! I, Magica de Spell, shall make sure you never have it, you sciocchezza! The First Dime is mine! Mine! Mine, you hear?!"

As he stepped out from behind his shield and cast a jelly-legs jinx, a body-bind hex, and various other spells that all failed to get past that duck's own magical screen, Harry irritably reflected that people a hundred miles away undoubtedly heard her. *What's so sodding important about a First Dime, whatever the bleeding hell that is?* grumbled the wizard inside his head, as he ducked back behind his shield just before several fireballs blazed from this Magica's wand, to explode against his protective spell.

With another flick of his wand, Harry repaired his shield, and he had another try at his enemy, who was now comparing the man's parents to a pimp and his most worthless whore. Maybe that lead to Harry's abrupt casting of a series of bludgeoning hexes being a bit more powerful than usual, as the entire factory rang to the sound of a half-dozen 'BANG!', each the result of collisions that fractured Magica's shield in numerous places, except for the last hex that bounced off the side, to hit a large piece of metal scrap lying on a table next to the witch, shattering this debris into innumerable splinters, fragments, and particles that sprayed up and out in a large cloud that pattered down onto the duck. Frantically repairing her shield back to its original strength, Magica only angrily brushed away the rusty chips of metal in her wig with her other hand, and then she made a sweeping wave with her wand that sent right at her foe's face a foot-wide blob of pure hydrochloric acid.

Harry didn't pay all that much attention to how this ball of corrosive liquid dissolved a good portion of the front of his shield, before it dribbled to the floor and started eating its way downwards to the basement level. Instead, he stood stock-still, mouth gaping open in shock, while marveling inside, *It can't be that easy!* Then, a really weird grin appeared on Harry's lips, as he also remembered how Hermione and her parents had several weeks ago invited him out to dinner at a fancy London restaurant that had been a rare moment of happiness in his life. This outing had only become more enjoyable, once Harry had gotten an answer concerning his question about something he'd read on the menu.

A gleeful glint in his eyes, Harry stepped away from his shield, and pointing his wand at Magica, the wizard intoned, "Flammeus aquae!" Instantly, a ray of reddish-yellow light burst from his wand, flashing towards the duck's shield, and bouncing off the face of this to then shoot straight up, until this beam impacted directly against a shabby and dilapidated air-conditioning unit right over Magica's head, transforming this heavy piece of machinery into something else that was certainly not part of any normal factory's building infrastructure.

Exulting over her opponent's evident failure in his unsuccessful attack, Magica pointed her wand at the floor before his shield, about to cast her most powerful earthquake spell that would surely cause the ground there to crumble into a crater and trap him. However, just before she sent off her evil spell, a most distracting occurrence came to pass, as something went 'plop!' right onto the middle of the duck's bill. Caught totally by surprise at this, the witch tried to see what had landed on top of her beak, even crossing her eyes to examine it, but to no avail, since whatever drop of liquid that had fallen on her was the exact same color--

Now looking up, Magica de Spell had only a fraction of a second to understand she'd lost the duel, as the immense ball of flavored liquid plummeted onto her, smashing the duck into instant oblivion, with then the sound now echoing throughout the entire factory of the final descent of two hundred gallons of orange sauce.

SPLAT!


	18. Chapter 18

From where he was standing on the front steps of the money bin, absently watching how four burly officers of the law were slowly but surely stuffing Magica de Spell into their Duckburg police car, despite all the biting, clawing, screaming, and kicking by that sorceress, Harry Potter said incredulously, "What do you mean, she can't be arrested? I guess a dimensional traveler like me might have a hard time pressing charges, but Gyro could clearly do so in his own case!"

Giving a resigned sigh as he clasped his hands behind his back while carelessly twirling something in his fingers, Scrooge McDuck kept his own intent gaze upon where the doors of the car were now shoved shut and locked, with all the exhausted policemen giving each other proud looks as they wiped their sweating brows. Magica's enraged face promptly appeared pressed up against the back windshield, her mouth opening and closing in unheard curses sent towards the pair at their location in front of the building. Ignoring this, Scrooge now looked up to meet Harry's irritated expression, and patiently answered the human.

"Mr. Potter, I'm afraid that Magica has diplomatic immunity. Since she never actually harmed either of you, the most we can do is to deport her back to Italy. However, there is actually a way of punishing her which I'm sure that you'll consider most appropriate." At those puzzling words, Harry watched as Scrooge brought his hands from behind his back to now holding up in his right hand a certain wand. Startled, the wizard watched in growing disbelief, as a snickering duck turned the wand to the horizontal position, gripping both ends in his hands, and with a quick twist of his feathered wrists, Scrooge McDuck snapped Magica de Spell's wand in half.

Dumbfounded, Harry switched his gaze from the separate pieces of wood in the elderly drake's hands, to back to the police car, which now drove away, all while a nearly psychotic witch tried unsuccessfully to claw her way through the rear windshield of the automobile in her efforts to escape and then assault her enemies. Looking back at Scrooge, Harry watched as the duck now contently tucked the pieces of the wand into his coat pocket. The avian met Harry's gaze and chuckled, "What made that even more fun was knowing Magica has to spend the next four months making herself a new wand. Adding to that more time to carry out her next scheme, it's going to be at least six months before I have to worry about her again."

"Oh," blinked Harry, still needing to recover at seeing how carelessly another mage's wand was destroyed, even if that evil sorceress had totally deserved it. Then, Harry was further startled by the next actions of the duck next to him.

Holding out his hand to be shaken by the Briton, Scrooge gave Harry an intent look, and said in a serious tone, "Mr. Potter, I wish to apologize for the way I treated you while you were previously in my money bin. Your recent actions have convinced me that you are indeed a fine young man, willing to protect and defend the innocent from those who would do them harm, even at the cost of injury to yourself."

"Er, thank you," Harry managed to say, while then putting his hand in Scrooge's grip, for that duck to give the wizard a firm handshake while smiling up at the astonished human. A moment later, when they'd let go of their grasp, an embarrassed Harry, casting around for a diversion, blurted out, "Ah, did Gyro tell you what happened? I thought he was still recovering when he left."

Scrooge shook his head, his eyes twinkling in a way that made Harry a little nervous, considering how much that habit reminded him so much of a certain manipulating older wizard. "No, while he's improving from his time in Magica's hands, enough to tell me he'll still help you get home, Gyro went off back to his laboratory in his floater car piloted by Helper. That little robot showed me everything."

"Showed? What do you mean, Mr. McDuck?" frowned Harry at the again-chuckling financier.

"Oh, didn't you know? Helper can record everything in his vicinity, and he can display both pictures and sound, just like a movie, against any blank wall. I got to see all that happened after he climbed out of Gyro's pocket, to the point where you, ah, celebrated your victory." At those last words, Scrooge finally lost control of himself, to start guffawing at the top of his lungs.

Harry's entire upper body instantly turned a bright scarlet, his overpowering blush caused by his memories of what he'd done when he'd defeated Magica in their duel. Not just taking care of his injuries, putting the unconscious witch in her own body-binding hex after cleaning her off, getting Gyro loose from his rope, and casting a spell to help the inventor start waking up. There were also the REALLY awkward recollections of transmuting a dirty tarpulain into a new set of underwear, pants, belt, socks, and shoes. Not to mention the point right after dressing himself, while not paying any attention at all to Helper standing next to his master lying comfortably on the floor, Harry had found a not-so-discreet corner to have a badly-needed, gloriously-long, bladder-relieving, total jimmy.

Trying desperately to come up with something to distract the duck still roaring with mirth, Harry had a sudden question appear in his mind, to be quickly spoken. "Mr. McDuck, do you have any idea just what something called a First Dime is? Magica mentioned that name during our duel, like it had something to do with myself and Gyro being kidnapped, but I don't--" Harry faltered during his inquiry, due to the abrupt change in the mood around the pair.

Scrooge McDuck had instantly stopped laughing, and the aged financier was now looking askance at Harry, wary suspicion on his feathered features. Sensing he'd said something potentially wrong, Harry had no idea what else to do, so he simply stood there and returned Scrooge's intent gaze. For a short period of time, these two beings simply stared at the other, taking the measure of each in their scrutiny.

Harry sensed that he was in the presence of a formidable personality, well equal to the other elderly individual the young man had known long enough to have extremely mixed feelings about: Albus Dumbledore. Though, the young wizard quickly came to the conclusion that while Scrooge McDuck was quite capable of being just as ruthless as the former Headmaster of Hogwarts, that duck wouldn't ever claim his actions were justified as being part of the 'greater good.' The richest duck in the world would always do what was best for Scrooge McDuck, and he would unhesitatingly tell this, right into their faces, of all of his friends and enemies. Yet, as long as someone was on his side, Scrooge would also totally back them up, including putting himself in personal danger while coming to their aid. On the other hand, his allies had better know they had as much chance as getting a single penny out of the duck's pockets as they did in kicking a hole through the extremely substantial steel walls of his money bin with their bare feet.

Through his pince-nez, Scrooge McDuck was also thoughtfully studying Harry Potter. Among the reasons for that financier's awesome success in business, besides his personal abilities and cleverness, was his additional knack for finding the perfect subordinates. The duck had learned that he could read a man's character just as easily as he could sweep his eye through a page of an account book, and in either case, he effortlessly saw what could best profit him. Here and now, a young man with bravery, determination, stubbornness, compassion, drive, imagination, and humor was looking back at him. True, the human lacked subletly, but since that was often accompanied by deceit, Scrooge didn't mind all that much. Inwardly, he relaxed, and made his decision.

"Mr. Potter, my name is Scrooge. May I call you Harry?"

A slow grin formed over the wizard's face at hearing that, since he'd come to the same assessment. Firmly nodding, Harry again stuck his hand out, and as it was once more clasped in another's grip, the man cheerfully said, "It's a pleasure, Scrooge. A real pleasure."

Eyes once more twinkling behind his glasses without sidepieces resting upon his bill, Scrooge took his hand away, and then waved this towards the building behind them, in a clear invitation. "Come along, Harry, and I'll tell you a story." At that, the duck turned and started up the steps, with the human promptly taking a few long strides to now walk along besides the avian. As they headed towards the front door of his money bin, Scrooge started speaking again.

"The First Dime is what Magica calls it, but in my mind, it's the Number One Dime. As a young laddie in Glasgow, I had my first job as a shoeshine boy when I was ten years old. My very first customer soon came along, and I did my best work on his footwear, making them shine like new. He paid me and left, and I put away that coin in a pocket of its own, since it was the first money I ever earned. Unfortunately at the end of that day, when I showed my father what I had, he told me that dime was an American coin, and it was basically worthless in Scotland." An irate glower abruptly appeared on Scrooge's features as he once more recalled a decades-old injustice. Continuing as they passed through the front doors, "Well, I kept on shining shoes, and then I found another, better paying job, and then another, and another…. But, during all that, I always kept that dime on me, as a reminder to never again be cheated or let down my guard in business." Scrooge waved his hand around the enormous foyer of the money bin they were now walking through. "You could say that all what I have now is a direct result of paying attention to that belief."

A fascinated Harry asked, "You've still got that dime?"

"Oh, yes indeed, though I no longer carry it on me. It's enough that it stays in my money bin. To be exact, through here." At those last words, the pair stopped in front of a massive vault door jutting from a reinforced wall of a strongroom buried inside the money bin. Politely, Scrooge requested, "Harry, would you mind turning around for a moment?"

Harry blinked, and then he turned on his heel, good-naturedly saying, "I know a goblin in a bank who would really like you." As the wizard stood here, hearing the lock of the vault door behind him being opened, a thoughtful voice replied to that.

"Goblins, eh? I've encountered them before, but I didn't know they came from your dimension."

Still with his back to the vault door, Harry perked up at what he'd just heard. "You'll have to tell me more about that! If these are the same kind of goblins, maybe I can get back home using whatever magic they use to travel from my original dimension to here." The wizard's enthusiams dampened slightly, as he admitted, "I have no doubt that if there's any chance of that, concerning goblins, it'll be expensive. Very expensive."

"That does sound promising, I must admit," grunted a clearly straining duck. "All right, Harry, you can turn around now."

The wizard did so, and now saw what he'd been expecting, the vault door almost half open. From where Scrooge was standing in the entry space caused by the door swinging outwards, that duck made a 'come-on' gesture, and then turned to step inside the vault. Harry willingly strode to and through the doorway, only to abruptly feel a truly strange and painful experience once he crossed the threshold of the vault room. Yelping in shocked surprise, the wizard made a practiced flick of his wrist, causing his wand to shoot out from his arm holster and then be gripped in his hand, to be frantically waved in the proper movement, as Harry then barked, "Protego alter!"

An overpowering sense of relief now came over Harry, with that man now able to switch his attention elsewhere. Mainly to where Scrooge McDuck was now standing facing Harry, that duck's eyes wide open in evident astonishment, with this banker's back to a second, even bigger vault door in the middle of another strongly-reinforced wall. A wall that currently had about a dozen small metal shelves attached to the face of this partition, all holding….wands.

To be precise, pieces of wands. All of these magical sticks were broken or shattered into two or more wood fragments, down to tiny splinters barely able to be seen in their positions resting on top of the shelves. Harry now shifted his gaping notice of this at Scrooge's plaintive question, "Harry, what the devil was all that about? Are you all right?"

The wizard shuddered at hearing that last inquiry, and irritably answered, "A second ago, I wasn't! When I came in here, I felt like, well, do you have here the same kind of blackboards that make a horrible screeching noise when a fingernail is dragged along them?"

The duck could only dumbly nod.

"Well, that's how I felt in every single nerve of my body, right into my magical core, only a hundred times worse! It didn't stop until I set up a personal protection spell that I'm still maintaining, and I won't shut it down until I get some answers! Such as, why are all those wands there?" Harry growled, using his own wand to point at those destroyed magical objects.

Scrooge jerked his head around to look over his shoulder at the wall and its contents, and when he brought back this to sheepishly look at Harry, the duck then fumbled something out of his coat pocket to show his guest. What was now on his outstretched palm were the two pieces of Magica's wand that Scrooge had snapped in half just a few minutes ago. Clearing his throat, the financier awkwardly explained, "Harry, just like this, those other wands are Magica's, and like this one, I destroyed the others when I, along with those who helped me, succeeded in defeating that witch in her attempts to take the Number One Dime. As I told you before, she won't try stealing it again without her wand, which I learned after the first time she failed and had to spend the next couple of months making a new wand."

Harry had to blink at this, to again gesture at all the broken wands on the shelves. "She's gone after it at least a dozen times? What the hell for? Is it valuable? The dime, I mean."

The duck just shrugged. "The coin itself is an 1875 Seated Liberty dime, and it has a numismatic value of only a few dollars. However, Magica seems to believe it's a lot more valuable than that due to it being some kind of lucky charm that made me so successful in business. She thinks if it's in her hands, she'll able to also become truly wealthy."

Hearing that, Harry looked intrigued. "There are stories of magical objects making people rich--"

"Oh, balderdash!" snapped Scrooge, interrupting Harry. "I built my fortune through hard work, sacrifice, savings, and my own talents, which included a willingness to take financial risks! If Magica had spent all that effort she did while trying to steal my dime into actually working for her money, she'd be a lot richer than she is! But just try explaining that to her! That witch just wants things the easy way, and in the process of that, she keeps trying to take something that's solely of sentimental value to me." An irate gleam now shone in the duck's eyes, as he waved at the wands arrayed in their shelves on the wall. "That's the reason I put those wands there in the first place, Harry. Partially to spite Magica, but also as, well, trophies of my victories over her."

Harry had to grin over that, and also what he'd just realized. "Scrooge, you were smarter than you knew when you did that. I think that by bringing together all those wands, you set up some kind of spell that created protections over your money bin, surrounding it with magical wards."

"ME?!" spluttered the duck. "I don't have any magical powers!"

"Oh, not you personally," declared Harry, shaking his head. "The magic is from the wands themselves. Magica created them and in doing so, she poured into them her personal power. Now that the wands are broken, their magic is, well, leaking out of them, as best I can express it to a non-magical person like you. While that's happening, the spells escaping from the wands must affect Magica really painfully if she dares to came anywhere near here, just like they did to me when I stepped into this room."

Scrooge was clearly thinking this over, until he came out with an objection. "Wait a second! I broke Magica's wand outside here just a few minutes ago, but you didn't show anything was wrong, and you were right next to me when I did it!"

Harry nodded at the dozen wands on the wall. "I think putting all those wands together amplified their power. In fact, if you add that wand you've got in your hand right now, you're only going to increase the warding, and make Magica stay even further away from here."

Scrooge's eyes narrowed at hearing that, with the duck then thoughtfully muttering, "Come to think of it, she's never directly attacked the money bin after the first few tries, and her further attempts have been elsewhere in Duckburg or other places." He now looked at the pieces of the wand he was still holding, and started chuckling. The financier then turned to head towards the wall and one of the shelves, putting the broken wand there next to another ruined magical rod. Turning to look at Harry standing there, Scrooge looked particularly gleeful, and then waved his hand at the vault door. "So, Harry, would you still like to see what that witch's been so pointlessly eager to get her hands on?"

Caught up in his companion's sudden good mood, Harry smiled at Scrooge, and cheerfully agreed, "Sure, Scrooge. Go ahead." At that, Harry now turned around, just like before, as the duck headed to work on the door vault lock in privacy.

Patiently staring ahead, the wizard heard from the duck a distracted question among the other sounds of his opening the vault. "Harry, is the fact that the wands were created by Magica also the reason why they didn't work on you before?"

Harry shrugged in perplexed consideration. "I think that I, or any other wizard and witch, had to be in close range, like the same room. After all, they didn't affect me when I, er, first appeared in the money bin, or when I was in the room before this one."

"That makes sense, I suppose," grunted Scrooge. "All right, Harry, come inside and feast your eyes upon the Number One Dime."

Once more, Harry turned around, to then follow Scrooge through the vault entranceway. Though once inside, the wizard acted differently, to instead step to the side of the room, out of the line of sight of the vault door, to again wave his wand while muttering, "Protego deminuo!"

A puzzled Scrooge had turned to watch his companion do this, to then stand there a bit warily, until the man's tense body relaxed, accompanied by a relieved sigh from the wizard. Curious, the duck inquired, "What'd you do, Harry?"

"I lessened my protective shield, to see if I'd still be affected by those broken wands back there," absently replied Harry. "It looks like my theory was correct, since I don't feel anything bad now that I'm out of that room. Let's get rid of the shield, then…." His voice trailing off, Harry waved his wand once more, speaking, "Protego compleo." A moment later, Harry nodded in satisfaction, and then while tucking away his wand back into his arm holster, the man looked with interest at what he'd now noticed in the center of the strongroom.

A metal, waist-high (well, for Harry. For Scrooge, it was chest-high.) column stood there, with a small object perched on top of the flat surface there of the column. This object looked a bit like a snow globe to Harry, with a solid circular metal base at the bottom, and a half-sphere of glass completely covering the contents. Though, instead of some kind of water-filled scene inside, there was a round black cushion, whereupon a tiny metal disk rested. Harry squinted at this, but he was a bit too far away to clearly see this presumed dime. Glancing over at Scrooge, an unspoken request in Harry's gaze that was responded with a nod of permission from the duck, the wizard stepped over to the column.

Stopping in front of this small pillar, Harry had a polite expression appear on his features, as he looked down at a somewhat dingy and worn coin. Abruptly, the wizard's face froze, as deep inside his mind, a charm that had been patiently awaiting, not just over the last couple of hours, but for at least twenty years into the past, now finally finished casting itself.

Sirius Black's absurd and defective prank that a generation ago had been aimed at James and Lily Potter (née Evans), in his joyous celebration of his best friends becoming married, now took over their son, one Harry Potter. In his suddenly-stunned mind at how his body was now acting completely on its own, Harry could only watch helplessly as his arms reached out for both hands to grasp the container holding the Number One Dime, for this item to be brought up to his face, his head to bend down, as Harry then bestowed upon the surface of the glass sphere a truly passionate smooch.

In the next instant, an aged duck showed that, despite the shockingly unexpected event that had just happened, plus his own advanced years, Scrooge McDuck could act as nimbly as ever. His headlong leap towards the column, arms outstretched as the duck crashed down and slid along the floor, was a complete (though painful) success, as the container holding his precious dime fell right into his cupped palms, from where it had begun its descent hanging in the air as the wizard that had just been kissing it abruptly vanished from the strongroom.

After a few necessary moments to recover, Scrooge then staggered back up to his feet, all while protectively holding to his chest his dime. Dazedly looking around, the financier called with total bewilderment in his voice, "Harry? Harry Potter? Are you here, Harry?" There was no answer for the only person now inside the room.

Absently replacing the container back onto the column, Scrooge made a complete slow turn around, suspiciously eyeing the entire vault room. There was still no sign whatsoever of his companion that had been with him just a few seconds ago. Once the duck was again in front of the column, he scratched his feathered head, and then Scrooge despondently shrugged. It was clear that something odd had happened, that the wizard hadn't expected at all. Either Harry would be back, or he wouldn't. If that human did come back, perhaps Scrooge would then actually get an explanation about the recent events. And if he didn't….

Scrooge sighed. In all his long life, the duck had learned that there were things that couldn't be helped. He'd miss somebody who'd aided him against an enemy, and which he had come to personally like, but in any case, life went on. Frankly, the financier needed to get back to work, so he might as well leave the room and….

Pausing in his thoughts, the immensely wealthy avian looked at his Number One Dime resting back in its proper place, and then he reached out to grasp and lift the undamaged container, to peer down at the small coin still in its position on the cushion. The duck frowned slightly at seeing the surface of the glass half-sphere a little smeared, and he used his coat sleeve to wipe it clean and clear. Then, after looking around the room a bit furtively, Scrooge McDuck gave the love of his life a strong kiss that was equal in its affection to what Harry Potter had bestowed several moments ago.


	19. Chapter 19

From where the man was lying face down on the floor, a very irritated complaint was heard: "I hate portkeys."

Warily tilting his head to the left to peek at his new location, wherever the hell that was, Harry Potter blinked at the leather wallet resting just a few inches from his nose. It looked rather familiar, and the wizard had sudden hope surge in his breast, as he instantly realized this folded case should have bloody well been familiar, since it was HIS wallet! The very same one he'd put down on the floor of his family vault, right before his unexpected journey into that weird Duckburg place with its talking poultry!

Scrambling to his feet, Harry made sure along the way to snatch up his wallet and hastily slip it into the back pocket of his pants. The way things had been happening lately, there was a very good chance that in his next breath he'd once again be sent off by magical means, dropping right into the middle of a full moon ceremony being conducted by several dozen gorillas and a guy with serious muscles wearing a leopard-skin loincloth.

When he was finally standing upright, the wizard cautiously looked around, and then he breathed an absolute sigh of relief at seeing the familiar confines of the Potter vault around him. Looking down at his hands, Harry wiggled his fingers, and the young man felt better when he understood that his body was again under his control.

"Bloody good thing, too. Going around kissing random objects would have been really difficult to explain," muttered Harry. He frowned, wondering just what the blazes all that had been for, dammit, only to reluctantly come to the conclusion that he'd probably never know, unless he managed to find a way back to Scrooge McDuck's money bin. Which was extremely unlikely, not to mention it was seriously doubtful of that action ever being high on Harry's list of to-do things. While that whole episode had been….interesting, and he'd come to like several of the, well, people he'd met, right now what the wizard most wanted to do was to leave the vault and Gringotts and return to Number 12 Grimmauld Place.

Just as he'd thought that last, Harry's stomach growled, causing the man to amend his intention, in that on the way back to his home, he should pick up a nice vindaloo. Another enthusiastic growl came from his stomach at that consideration. His mind made up, a hungry Harry started off towards the vault door, while an idle thought carelessly passed through his consciousness that at least the whole idiotic business was completely over and done with.

An instant later, two beings popped into existence right in front of Harry.

In a blur, the wizard's wand was drawn from his arm holster and pointed right at the materialized pair standing in the center of the vault passage, with Harry about to shout "Stupefy!", until that man's lips froze before uttering even the first syllable of his spell. Frankly, the son of two Marauders had good reasons for his own sudden and total stupefaction. Three specific reasons, actually.

First, his unexpected guests were Remus Lupin and Sirius Black.

Second, both of these people were completely different from the mature, worn men he'd come to know when they'd been battered and beaten by the hard times these wizards had lived through. Right now, in the Potter vault, cheerfully looking at the last of that name were a pair of chaps that didn't seem any older than Harry himself was at the present, not being aged more than twenty or so years.

Finally, Sirius and Remus were both totally ramped, faced, arse-over-tit, tooled, mullered, juiced up, rat-arsed, tanked, either couldn't see a hole in a ladder, blotto, full to the bung, tol-lol, wankered….

In short, drunk.

A disbelieving Harry Potter now dazedly watched and listened to a Sirius weaving on his feet, whose swaying body differed entirely from his steady, jovial voice, "Hello, James and Lily! Now, I would just like to say--"

Whatever else might have been about to be spoken by that member of the Black clan was abruptly interrupted by the other, whose inarticulate statement at the top of his lungs also differed entirely from Remus' unwaveringly pointing at his friend while shouting, "ISH ALL HISH FAULT!" The bottle in the deathgrip of the werewolf's other hand didn't quiver the slightest either during that verbal attack upon the man next to him.

Turning his head with some difficulty to focus upon Remus standing by him, Sirius coldly spoke, "Thanks ever so much for your loyal support, you prat!"

An indifferent shrug was Remus' only reaction to that, with the future professor's attention being more concentrated upon the bottle he'd then lifted to his lips to send a few more good swallows of booze down his throat. Sirius spent the next several moments glowering at his friend, until you could actually see the light dawn upon his features, as the maddest prankster of the Marauders finally remembered he needed to begin the conversation again. Bringing his head around, Sirius beamed at his audience, not paying any attention to the fact he'd overcompensated and the seriously-pissed individual was starting to tilt to the left, looking past his listener.

Unconsciously, Harry also leaned over to his right, to continue gazing at his godfather into that man's maniacally gleaming eyes, as Sirius started over. "Ahem. As I was saying before a total berk broke in, I might have had something to do with your little jaunt away from your wedding gifts. Now, the fact that this charm is working shows you both got back all safe and sound, so why don't we just have a good laugh about this, and then put everything behind us?" An attempt was now made by Sirius to clap his hands in a positive manner, in an hopeful effort to emphasize this optimistic resolution to their pending little contretemps. Unfortunately, this wasn't really helped by the fact that Sirius managed to miss with both hands his brief applause.

A disgusted belch was Remus' contribution of his opinion over that suggestion, along with that man edging away from Sirius' flailing right hand, as it came dangerously near the bottle the werewolf was still tenaciously clutching.

Frowning down at his traitor hands, Sirius glanced up, squinting and blinking, while regaining his train of thought (otherwise known as the Totally Disastrous Explanation Express, with a nice, shiny steam locomotive, tender, passenger and freight cars, caboose, all heading at full speed toward the gap in the tracks and without even a valiant Little Eric waving a red flag to stop the train and win fame and popularity, not to mention the hand of Mathilda the milkmaid). Giving an hopefully ingratiating smirk, a rush of words suddenly came from Sirius.

"Listen, mate, and, um, matess, I did it all because I love you both! I want the pair of you to have a long and happy life together, with lots and lots of little nippers for Uncle Sirius and Uncle Whatisname" (an unheeded growl rumbled through the air at that) "to spoil rotten! But I also don't want you to forget us, either! We….we don't have anybody but you that we can call family with a straight face! So, uh, could you just find it in your hearts to…." Gulping, a tearful Sirius now dropped to his knees, and clasping (successfully this time) his hands together, and lifting his joined fingers upwards in a prayerful attitude, that man opened his mouth in one last appeal, only to stop short.

Carefully examining the level of liquid remaining in the bottle, Remus eventually became distracted by the evident change in the local mood that he now sensed, as he glanced over at where Sirius had been, to stare in puzzlement at the empty space there, until he finally looked down into his friend's face glaring up at him.

"Oh. Right," blinked Remus, who then carefully got down on his own knees, to imitate Sirius in also clasping his hands, both keeping them now at chest level. An exasperated roll of Sirius' eyes was made when this was finally accomplished, with that man muttering to Remus, who solemnly nodded at the next words.

"Ready? All right, then, on three. One, two, three!"

Simultaneously, both men quickly thrust up their clasped hands in clear appeal, even with Remus' bottle still in his grip being waved on high, as the pair of Hogwarts graduates bellowed as plaintively possible:

"PLEASE DON'T HEX US TO LOOK LIKE SNAPE!"

There was a second of frozen silence, their bodies equally immobile, until Sirius Black and Remus Lupin now dropped their hands to then promptly wrap their near arms around each others' shoulders, to wave gaily with their other arms at their unseen audience, while laughing with true joy, knowing they, all four of the Marauders, were and would be friends forever.

It was then that the twenty-year-old charm flickered out of existence, taking the images along with it, as Harry Potter paid no attention to this, being more fully occupied by lying on his back and howling with laughter up at the ceiling of his family vault.

As the very last person pranked by the Marauders sustained his bellows of mirth, Harry's mood began to subtly transform the longer his amusement continued. Soon enough, his laughter slowly modified itself into deep gasps for air, which gradually changed into choking sobs that lengthened into moans, then wails, culminating in long screams of ultimate grief.

In his treasure room that contained generations of heirlooms and records of his ancestors' joys and sorrows, the young man writhed on the floor, beating with his fists the uncaring stone, and he cried for them all. His parents, Sirius, Remus, Tonks, Fred, and so many more. With none to stop, hear, or be alarmed by Harry's anguish, he was at last able to mourn until he could physically do so no longer.

Finally, a wizard blankly stared up at a vault ceiling until he gradually stirred. Barely conscious of what he was doing, Harry tugged from his back pocket his wallet, flipping it open and tapping the correct code on the front of the wallet to cast the Extension Charms. Then, Harry shoved the wallet away and went back to contemplating the ceiling for an unknown period of time.

Eventually, Harry turned his head, to look at the open manhole in the floor, where railings had extended themselves waist-high for those to grasp while descending into their magical structure. He lethargically stared at these safety measures, until Harry in the end slowly turned over, to bring himself up on his hands and knees, and crawled over to the manhole. Peering down into this circular opening, Harry dully noted the stairs leading to the bottom, and managing to marshal his sluggish thoughts to turn around, he began to slowly let himself down feet first and facing the stairs, as he carefully lowered himself to shelter.

One thing common to the absolutely top-of-the-line Extension Charms was that they would magically reshape themselves, if it was both safe and secure to do so, into whatever new manifestation their owner requested, expected, or needed. It wasn't anything like the Room of Requirements in that the new change could be whatever mentally asked for, since only what was already inside the extensioned object would be produced.

However, because it was quite possible for people to enter their charmed article while needing medical help, a fully-stocked potions pharmacy was part of the healing spells and enchantments built into the extensioned object. All too conscious of his past innumerable visits to Hogwarts' hospital beds, when buying that magical item, Harry had specified that he wanted the best of everything needed to care for sick or injured people.

Which was when Harry finally came to the foot of the stairs, to slump down and huddle against these, the lights in the small foyer came on, and at the bottom of the wood-paneled wall nearest to the numb man, a cupboard materialized, with the door to this then slowly swinging open. Inside the small cupboard was a small potions bottle, its cap missing and clearly ready to be drunk. Harry made an apathetic decision and reached out to remove the potions bottle, bringing it to his lips and draining it to the last drop.

As the potion moved down his throat, the first thing it did was to heal his vocal cords severely strained by his screams, and then it reached his stomach, to send a warm wave of energy throughout his body. Not to mention satisfying Harry's appetite. As a consequence, the not-so-weary wizard managed to finally rise to his feet, to then head towards the door leading out of the foyer. Again, the structure refashioned itself to its master's unspoken commands, and the door opened to an exact copy of the Prefect's bathrooms in Hogwarts (men's section).

Peeling off his entire clothes while walking into the room and leaving all these garments lying untidily on the floor, Harry staggered into the shower section, with every one of the dozen spray nozzles promptly providing the man's soaking exactly the way he wanted it: hot and strong. Harry luxuriated in his shower for a long time, until he felt he'd had enough, and then the wizard turned to walk out of the cubicle tiled in red and gold. Once he left, the shower instantly turned itself off, with a heated towel appearing on a shelf next to the nude man. Picking this up to rub himself dry, Harry continued his steps towards another door at the end of the bathroom, which swung itself open at his approach.

A few moments later, a man wrapped in a bathrobe with the Potter family seal embroidered on the chest sat in an easy chair, staring out the window. Unlike the panes on the front of Number 12 Grimmauld Place, this casement had an entirely different scene outside. A specific request by the wizard concerning his purchase of the Undetectable Extension Charms had resulted in the vista he was only partially paying attention to at the moment. Unlike before, Harry Potter was more preoccupied by other things than enjoying the magnificent scenery of the Scottish lake, hills, and environs from his old window in the Gryffindor tower of Hogwarts Castle.

Remaining immobile except for eye-blinks, Harry tried to understand how he felt right this minute, in his very soul. He was….empty? Hollow? No, a better term would be….released. His essence, spirit, all that made him Harry James Potter was finally free. Where upon his psyche there had rested an immense weight of guilt, sorrow, responsibility, and remorse, all these were now just…gone.

The only time he'd felt like this was during his….death, when Harry had traveled to the other side, to again meet Dumbledore and his parents, and make the choice that sent him back, to at last confront and defeat Riddle. During all that had happened later, with the battle, the clean-up, and going on with everyone's life, Harry had talked to only two people about what had happened to him. Both Hermione and Ginny had patiently listened to his fumbling attempts to speak of his experience, and oddly, both had given him the same advice: wait and think about it, so it's more clear to you, and you can then tell us about it much better than you're doing right now. Harry had been so relieved he hadn't needed to completely explain himself to the women he loved that the wizard had willingly agreed to defer his account until later. Well, later was here.

Thinking hard in his seat, Harry finally understood that his collapse in the vault room would have come sooner or later. Nearly a decade fighting in a war of magic had cost Harry an incredible price upon both his body and mind, and ultimately the price needed to be paid, as it now had been in his family's savings room, months after his death at Voldemort's hands. A wry smile tugged at Harry's lips, as he quoted a goblin, "All debts are settled."

The smile on the face of the wizard began to grow, as he thought about what exactly had brought on this conclusion. An absurd prank that had led to an equally absurd journey, to cause Harry Potter to meet extremely strange people, and be thoroughly distracted from his troubles, so that once he'd come home, he could finally face up to his lifetime of grief and pain. Which led Harry to understand at long last, he had a….lifetime. He'd been loved by his mum and dad, by Sirius and Remus, even by Dumbledore himself, and he still had their love. Now he had a lifetime to love those with him -- Ginny, Hermione, Ron, Neville, Luna, and so many others -- and also those who would come later. His children.

And during that time…. Harry James Potter sat up in his seat, and then he decisively cracked his knuckles, all while mentally listing his assets:

He had perhaps the strongest magical powers of any human in all of Britain.

He had the extremely large fortunes of the Potter and Black families, overseen by the goblins who both respected and feared him.

He had numerous friends who'd totally proven their love and loyalty in a war to the death.

He had enough renown and fame that meant every single magical person in the country knew about him and in the main, they approved of who he was, what he'd done, and what he might do in the future, on his own or in the corridors of power.

Finally, he was himself and nobody else, the wizard known as Harry who was going to start making his mark upon his society, for good or ill.

"Right," chuckled the man with the untidy hair and the piercing green eyes currently dancing with mischief. "Let's go prank the entire Wizarding World."


End file.
